NEUTRAL DUTIES.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXX, Issue 1, 19 August 1914, Page 4

NEUTRAL DUTIES.

Commenting on Germany’s breaches of international compacts. Wellington’s Post says;—On present evidence Germany’s actions have amounted to a declaration that an agreement is only binding till one of the parties feels strong enough to break it. The people here know well how Germany’s unwillingness to give a guarantee to respect Belgium’s neutrality—to which the Kaiser’s representatives had solemnly agreed—brought Britain into the war. The next International Conference will have some arduous work in discussing the rights and duties of neutral countries in relation to belligerents. At the Conference in London five years ago an attempt was made to reduce the vagueness of some of the regulations adopted at The Hague in 1907, but the ideal was not achieved. In theory, says one writer, a neutral country is expected to “abstain from everything which could even remotely be of assistance to either belligerent,” but this prinicple of perfection is impracticable. Neutral duties, 1 as defined by The Hague Conference, have been summarised thus “Absolute : Abstention from any direct corporate assistance to either belligerent; enforcement of respect by both belligerents for neutral territory. Relative: Prevention of any recruiting for either belligerent, or arming and equipping vessels for the service of a belligerent. Contingent: Allowing commercial access to the one or other belligerent without distinction, and granting impartially to one or the other belligerent any rights, advantages, or privileges which, according to the usages recognised among nations, are not con-] sidered as an intervention in the struggle.” Thus the United States of America has apparently agreed to capply coal to either German or British warships, and Denmark is impartially sending food to Britain and Germany.