THE ANGLO-TURKISH CONVENTION.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 28, 1 February 1913, Page 4

THE ANGLO-TURKISH CONVENTION.

It is more than thirty years since, by the Anglo-Turkish Convention, “reforms” were guaranteed by Turkey to Armenia, and at the same time Britain undertook to defend Turkey by force of arms from attacks by Russia and took Cyprus in pledge, nominally in order to assist her in case she had to fulfil this obligation. The terms of this Convention are precise“lf any attempt is made at any future time by Russia to take possession of any further territories of His Imperial Majesty the Sultan in Asia . • Rugland engages to join His Imperial Majesty the Sultan in defending them by force of arms.” A writer in the ‘Manchester Guardian’ points out that the “reforms” have never to this day been carried out. There has instead been continuous aggression varied by massacre. The question arises : hat is to happen now? Are the reforms at length to be granted—there wi.l'be desperate need of them—and if they are, will Britain’s obligation to defend Turkey against Russia revive? Or will oppression and massacre continue? In that case the intervention of Russia can hardly be averted. The same writer brings to memory the story of how Air. Gladstone, who was then vehemently anti-Turk, denounced this Constantinople Convention as “insane.” Disraeli’s reply is notorious: “1 do not pretend,” he said, “to bo as competent a judge of insanity as lire right hon. gentleman. I will not say to the right hon. gentleman what 1 had occasion to say in the House of Lords this year, ‘Xaviget Anticyram, but I would put this issue to an intelligent British jury: Which do yon behove most likely to enter into ‘an insane Convention,’ a body of English, gentlemen, honoured by the favour of j their Sovereign and the confidence of j their fellow-subjects, managing youn affairs for five years, I hope with pru-j deuce, and not altogether without suc-j cess, or a sophistical rhetorician inebriated with the exuberance of his own verbosity and gifted with an egotistical imagination that can at all times com-

maud an interminable and inconsistent series of arguments to malign his op' pommits and glorify himself.”