A—ll

that such questions as frontiers, disarmament, reparations, minority rights, and the destroying of Fascism were of direct concern to New Zealand, and of even more vital indirect concern through their reaction upon Britain. In addition, the settlement of the Italian colonies involved the security of the Mediterranean, an area of vital importance to the scattered members of the British Commonwealth. Upon the instructions of the Government the New Zealand delegate urged upon the Conference that the United Nations Organization, which is primarily concerned with the maintenance of world peace, should be associated with r the making of the peace settlement; that the principles of the Atlantic Charter providing for consultation of the inhabitants should be observed when territorial changes were in question, and that, in any case, territories should not change hands without full protection of the rights of the people involved; and that the Security Council of the United Nations should determine the level of armaments to be permitted to ex-enemy States. The delegation opposed the tendency to deal with economic questions and frontier settlements in arbitrary fashion by emphasizing that living men and women with feelings and rights were involved in every decision, and that the attitude of those people had a direct effect on future peace. Moreover, since the peace must be enforced for many years it was necessary to make a peace which would not only be based on justice, but would also appear just to future generations. The delegation welcomed, in certain instances, the establishment of international control of areas which involve the economy of more than one country, or of territories whose people would not otherwise be able to maintain their political or cultural independence. It was necessary to emphasize, however, that the Great Powers should not take the responsibility of advancing such solutions unless they were unitedly resolved to uphold them as permanent. It was also necessary to ask the Great Powers to give a clear guarantee that they regarded the compromise solutions, which the Conference had no choice but to accept, as being something more permanent than mere temporary reconciliations of their divergent interests and hopes. New Zealand took the lead in advocating the association of the United Nations with the peace settlements, and urged especially that the United Nations was the body most competent to investigate and determine the future of the Italian colonies. The temper of the Conference was, however, not sympathetic to United Nations' solutions. For reasons fully explained in its report, the delegation was not satisfied with the procedure of the Conference, which gave the seventeen smaller Allies little choice but to accept the peace settlement which the Big Powers had reached in private, and considered that the peace treaties which emerged from the Conference were inadequate and often unjust. Nevertheless, it was considered that the only reasonable conduct was to be loyal to the settlement finally reached and to guard against the world insecurity caused by " revisionism" by upholding it as permanent unless changed through legitimate United Nations' machinery. The draft peace treaties, as revised by the Council of Foreign Ministers in the light of the Conference, were signed on behalf of New Zealand by Mr. Jordan at Paris on 10th February, 1947. The question of ratification will be taken up by the Government following consideration of the treaties and the report of the New Zealand delegation by Parliament. 3. German and Austrian Peace Settlements As the New Zealand Government plays no part in the occupation and control of Germany, the Department's most obvious continuing function in German matters has been to co-ordinate instructions and information on New Zealand's reparations claims against Germany for the New Zealand representative on the Inter-allied Reparations Agency in Brussels. Basic long-term policy towards Germany has, however, been under study since hostilities ended, and has assumed particular importance since the decision of the Council of Foreign Ministers, in December, 1946, that Deputies should be appointed to hear the views of Allied belligerents against Germany, and to institute procedure for the preparation of the German peace treaty.

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