LEAGUE’S WORK

Hokitika Guardian, 18 August 1933, Page 6

LEAGUE’S WORK

A HE VIEW OF THE POSITION

LONDON, July 20.

A gatlieriiig held in his honour by the League of Nations Union Sir Eric Drummond, the Into. Secretary-General, recapitulated the main political disputes which had come before the League:—-ike . Aaland Islands question, the Polish-Lithuankn quarrel, the Greco-Bulgarian dispute, the Corfu affair, the Albanian-Yugoslav situation, the Mosul boundary, the Sino- : Japanese .dispute, the OolonibianvPeruvian trouble, and the difficulty between the United Kingdom, and Persia over the Anglo-Persian Oil concession, j Miany. other political subjects, probably some 20 to 25, have .been submitted to and settled, by the League, but there were nine questions, some of which represented a serious menace to peace, and all of which contained threatening possibilities. In every case except one the League, had either solved the dispute directly, or aided iu finding a solution by peaceful moans. One present failure,, out of nine—surely that was a good record.? But, alas, too, little was made of the successes of the League, sometimes they almost passed unnoticed in the press. Much appeared, in the newspa pel's about the outbreak and early stages of the Anglo-Persian dispute, but little about its settlement, and hardly any credit was given to- the League for "it. While if a failure occurred they were told on all sides that the League was-futile and its colttinuance a dangerous illusion 'and extravagance. On political grounds alone the League had far more than justified its existence, hut apart from all the. political activities there was the huge credit balance that the League had amassed on tlic social side, such as progress in international' health, in stopping the traffic in drugs, and the traffic In women. Perhaps it was because the activities of the League were so widespread that they were insufficiently recognised. Perhaps too, the League being composed of Governments, the results, though known to the various Government departments, were ignored by the public' as a whole, It Was, therefore, above all a. diffusion of knowledge that was required.