THE EUROPEAN TROUBLE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 19049, 28 June 1924, Page 15

THE EUROPEAN TROUBLE

ANGLO-FRENCH PACT. DENIAL BY BRITISH PREMIER. LONDON, June 26. In the House of Commons, Mr. MacDonalds was questioned in reference to a statement attributed to M. Harriot in an interview with the Independence Beige, which had aroused a furious controversy in the Frauico-British Press, that, in the event of a premeditated German attack he had. received the firm promise that Britain, as in 191.4',, would be on the side of France and Belgium, and had the assurance of a firm pact tending the three countries.

Mr. MacDonald (cmnk'ined that hiconversations With M. Herriot had been grossly misrepresented and falsified in certain newspapers. His communique of the 22nd and his statement of the 23rd covered the whole ground of the conversations. The reports mentioned, in question were based on either confusion or imagination. There was absolutely no kind of undertaking as’< regards a defensive military alliance so far as his conversations.with M. Herriot were concerned. I FRENCH PREMIER’S PROPOSAL. LONDON, June 26. Widespread interest has been evinced in Norman Angel’s interview with M. Herriot published in the New Leader, wherein M. Herriot explains the adoption of a new policy of giving France security against a German menace. M. Herriot proposes that the A Mies enter a pact of mutual assistance under Articles 10, 16, and 21 of the League of Nations, Germany being subsequently allowed to become a party to the pact. M. Herriot said: “I do not merely mean that Germany is to become a member of the League. I mean it will be open to her to join the Allied pact. We shall accord Germany the protections embodied in the pact, if she assumes its obligations. My statement astonishes you! I will tell you something which will astonish you more. Mollet, though a soldier, stands by the principle of inclusion of Germany in the pact.”