BRITAIN WILL NOT MEDIATE, UNLESS ASKED, IN CHINA.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18465, 17 May 1928, Page 5

BRITAIN WILL NOT MEDIATE, UNLESS ASKED, IN CHINA.

(United Press Assn.—By Electric Tel egraph.—Copyright.) (Received May 17, 11.30 a.m.) RUGBY, May 16. A question was asked to-day in the House of Commons as to whether, in view of the developments in the Far East, the Foreign Secretary would consider offering to the contending parties in China the good services of this country in bringing the civil war to a close. Mr Locker-Lampson, Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, replied that while his Majesty’s Government were anxious to see the re-establishment of peace in China any attempt at mediation, particularly at the present juncture, would bo extremely delicate and would, he feared, be misinterpreted. His Majesty's Government felt therefore that they could not take any step of this nature unless definitely invited to do so on both sides.

Replying to a question in the House of Lords this evening, Lord Cushendun, British representative on the Council of the League of Nations, said that Sir Austen Chamberlain, Foreign Secretary, had not allowed the state of affairs in China to go for so long without considering whether the League of Nations could take any part in bringing about peace, but there was no such thing as a Government in China. The Nanking Political Committee had addressed a telegram to the Secretary-General at Geneva, but the Political Committee was not a member of the League of Nations. At the present moment the British Government had no locus standi on which it could support the application of the Nanking Political Committee.—British Official Wireless.