MACDONALD AT GENEVA.

Wairarapa Age, 16 March 1933, Page 5

MACDONALD AT GENEVA.

CONTEMPLATING DEFINITE CONVENTION. OF WIDEST POSSIBLE SCOPE. TEMPER. OF EUROPE VISIBLY DEGENERATING. GENEVA, March 14. Mr. MacDonald is believed to be contemplating a definite disarmament convention, as wide and concrete as possible. The British spokesman declares that the adjournment of the Disarmament Conference would be useless in the present temper of Europe; which is visibly degenerating. MEETING POSTPONED. HOPES OF MORE RAPID PROGRESS. - RUGBY, March 14. The meeting of the General Committee of the Disarmament Conference, fixed for to-morrow has been postponed until Thursday in order that the subcommittees of the Conference and certain committees of the League Assembly and Council may have an opportunity of making more rapid progress. Meanwhile, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald and Sir John Simon were engaged in conversations with many leading delegates yesterday, and to-day the Prime Minister will continue his work of preliminary exchanges of view.—(British Official Wireless.) FORCE AND PEACE. •M. HENRY BERENGER’S VIEW.. CONFERENCE A CASINO. PARIS, March 14. Likening the Disarmament Cbnfereneee to a casino in which every nation is playing the game for the maintenance of its political prestige, M. Henri Berenger, Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Senate, warns France and Britain to hold on to their defensive forces; otherwise there is no way of escaping a conflagration. M. Berenger considers that Mr. MacDonald and M. Paul Boncour ean achieve nothing useful for peace at the Geneva Disarmament Conference, which being the hybrid daughter of Americanism and the League of Nations, is at last forced to unveil its original sins. The newspapers criticise Mr. MaeDonald, some describing him as a gobetween in the efforts of Germany and Italy to blackmail France. They reiterate that in the face of a united passionate Germany it is impossible to reduce the only force in Europe capable of making an aggressor think twice. All the papers agree that disarmament is definitely doomed. GERMANY’S DEMAND. DISARMAMENT AND EQUALITY. (Received Wednesday, 7 p.m.) BERLIN, March 14. Sir Horace Rumbold, British Ambassador to Germany, discussed with Baron von Neurath the present situation, with special reference to disarmament. Baron von Neurath replied that Germany’s attitude was unaltered. She expected others to disarm and to be given full equality. ARMS EMBARGO. U.S.A. GOVERNMENT’S AIM. WASHINGTON, March 14. The Government has informed Britain that it will press for legislation permitting the President to declare an arms embargo against any nation in the world.