REPARATIONS

Hokitika Guardian, 22 May 1929, Page 4

REPARATIONS

AI. POINCARE’S PLEA. bulled Press Association.—By Electric iciegii.pn.—copyright.) PARIS, May 20. In view of the dangers arising from rebuilding on one of the sites where masses of shells and explosives might ho buried, the reconstruction of Dominion! has been prohibited. Al. Poincare, Premier of France, in unveiling the monument to the razed village, said that its dispossessed inhabitants had the. right to demand iliat their fate should be remembered when the larger question of the reparations was being discussed. An equitable settlement of reparations should not leave France to bear one penny of .he expenditure that was forced upon her by the German aggression, whether to restore the devastation in her provinces, or to pay pensions to the victims. But, he said, France had aoamloned the hope of such a favourable: settlement. Inspired by the desire for a reconciliation, France had agreed to lrtsh investigations, and had done all that was possible to facilitate the work of. the. experts, merely insisting that the Dawes Plan should not he surrendered in exchange for a more precarious system. An economic revival should lie reached, he added, be a deliinite settlement, but it would lie unjust and intolerable if this should be dime at the expense of martyred and .ravaged France.. HIS.A. CONCESIQN, ; HEARTENS THE EXPERTS. LONDON, May 21. The “Times” Paris correspondent states : Air Nelson, the American Observer, attended a meeting of the creditor' groups of the Committee of Experts, and announced the American Government had come to a .decision to abandon part of the American claim to the arrears for the cost of the Rhineland occupation. The value of this concession is estimated at four hundred thousand sterling yearly. It 'impressed, the ' Committee, and heartened them to , attempt to reach a unanimous agreement.