GERMAN BRIBES.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1220, 31 August 1911, Page 5

GERMAN BRIBES.

MOROCCAN REVELATIONS.

By Telegraph-Press Association-Oojiyright Tangier, August 29. A feeling prevails that the FrancoGerman negotiation? for a settlement of the Moroccan question ivill lie prolonged v.nlil tho' result is known of Mimnosmann Bros.' investigations a-s to the mineral wealth or otherwise of tho Sus region. It is estimated that Germany lias spent .£IOO,OOO in bribes in Morocco, of which amount the Sultan Mulai IFa fid received .£60,000 for concessions to German firms.

IN BELLICOSE MOOD. , THE LATEST PRESS REPORT. (Rec. August 31, 1.20 a.m.) Berlin, August 30. Tho official organ of the Regency of Brunswick states that if the new French proposals regarding Morocco are unacceptable- to Germany tho latter will regard herself no longer bound by the Act of Algeciras, and after reinforcing her fleet in Moroccan waters will resort to independent measures in Southern Morocco. THE KAISER'S SPEECH. (Rec. August 31, 1.30 a.m.) Berlin, August 30. Outside the Socialist party the Kaiser's Hamburg speech is regarded as inconvenient, as an increase- of tfcp navy means an increase of taxation and a consequential increase of the Socialist vote. MERE GUESSWORK? (Rec. August 31, 1.30 a.m.) Vienna, August 30. In well-informed circles it is believed that tho "Nene Freie Presse's" alleged interview with a British diplomat was based on mere guesswork.

Morocco is a country rich in minerals and a, large number of financial syndicates, most of them of a more or less cosmopolitan character, lay claims to mining concessions. Ot these the two most powerful are tho Mannesmann group and the Union des Mines Marocaine. Tho Mannesmann Brothers in 1908 professed to have- acquired concessions worth .£10,000,000 for a sum of .615,000. In a collection of documents published by the German Foreign Office at tho beginning of 1010 it was explained that the German Empire regards tho enterprises of the Brothers Mannesmann in Morocco with tho utmost goodwill that is compatiblo with avoidance of deliberate bicurh of binding international agreements and treaties. It was "precisely out of respect for , tho Mannesmann undertakings that Germany, in tho summer of 1908, entered a successful protest against the intention of the then Sultan Abdul Aziz, who wns completely under the influence of the French, to proclaim a mining law which favoured exclusively tho interests of the French. It was in consenuenco of this protest— upon tho initiative, therefore, of Germany—that on August 20, 190S, tho Algcciras Powers arrived at a resolution to tho effect that the Sultan should issueno mining law without tho co-operation of tho Algeciras Powers, but that the mining law should bo: discussed by the Powers in common before it -was proclaimed.".