LEAGUE VINDICATED

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 296, 14 December 1931, Page 1

LEAGUE VINDICATED

Manchurian Situation Reviewed. LORD GREY’S OPINION. United Press Assn.—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright. (Received December 14, 11.30 a.m.) RUGBY, December 13. Lord Grey and Lord Cecil, who returned yesterday from Paris, at the conclusion of the League Council meeting, spoke at a demonstration in London last night on the Manchurian i^ation. Lord Grey said that he thought that those who took an extreme view, saying that the Manchurian dispute had shown the futility of the League, were very mistaken. Looking back to before the war he thought of the complications to which such a dispute would give rise, and as a result he said:

“ Thank Heaven there has been a League of Nations.” The League had prevented the present dispute from spreading. It had enabled the Powers to work together to promote peace instead of playing each its own hand. It had changed the pre-war assumption that the third-party intervention was an unfriendly act, and now, on the contrary, it was an infringement of the honour of a Power if it did not accept mediation. Both Japan and China had admitted the right of the League Council to investigate. Moreover, it had been made clear that the Paris Pact and the League Covenant were in line. The United States had taken an active and beneficial hand. Japan had a strong case in Manchuria, and he regretted that she had not submitted it to the League before she took military action, which, it seemed to him, was not in accordance with the Covenant or the Pact.

Lord Cecil, in referring to the League Commission which the Council had decided to send to Manchuria, said that he believed that it was a tremendous opportunity. If they were fortunate they might succeed in removing once and for all the war cloud in the Far East.