JAPAN'S DEMANDS AND COUNCIL'S POWERS

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 55, 27 November 1937, Page 5

JAPAN'S DEMANDS AND COUNCIL'S POWERS

(British Official "Wireless).

(Received 27, 12.30 p.m.) RUGBY, Nov. 26. Replying to questions in the Souse of Commons, Yiscount Cranborne said he understood that the Council of the International Settlement at Shanghai was being pressed by the Japanese authori- - ties to take aetion in matters such as the suspension of broadcasting and other Chinese activities, the closing of Chinese Government offices and the removal of officials, the suppression of the Chinese Press, and postal censorship. Britain, Yiscount Cranborne added, had not been consulted as io the course to be pursued by the British members of the municipal authority. It was not within the council 's power to deport people except by the legal process, and he had no information that the council had removed any Chinese officials. The authority of the municipal administration, he explained, was derived from the land regulations, by which powers to keep good order and government of the settlement were delegated to it by China. The precise extent of those powers was a matter for interpretation, which was in the first place the council 's responsibility. He did not think it would be proper for him to assume such an interpretation in advance of the council.