PROPOSED REVISION

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 141, 15 May 1940, Page 8

PROPOSED REVISION

AMERICAS’ i ZUTRALITY. (United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph.-—Copyright.) WASHINGTON, May 13. The Secretary of State (Mr Cordell Hull) has adopted a cautious attitude toward Argentina’s suggestion that tho Americas should confer immediately and adopt a “realistic” revision of the Western Hemisphere’s neutrality status. Mr Hull said he had not received tho text of the communique of the Argentine Foreign Minister (Senor Cantilo), but he indicated he would study it in detail before taking a definite position regarding the matter. A message from Panama City says the Foreign Secretary (Senor Garaz) said he was making contact with all the Americas to learn if they wished to make a united protest against the German invasion of Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg.

La Nacion, the Buenos Aires paper, has received reports from Washington that diplomats are giving serious attention to a new declaration of solidarity which would advance the status of the Western Hcmipslicrc from complete neutrality to a proposition more akin to Italy’s non-belligerency, states a Daventry report. A high official said: “The concept of neutrality under international law has disappeared in the face of developments in Europe. The American countries should revise their neutrality and make it more flexible and more active. Without entering the war they should he able to proceed at their own. convenience and not be bound by a judicial concept of neutrality.”