THE ENTENTE.

Taranaki Daily News, 19 January 1922, Page 5

THE ENTENTE.

AGREEMENT IN POLICY. MEASURES FOR DEFENCE. TO SECURE REPARATION. By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. Received Jan. 18, 5.5 p.m. London, Jan. 18. M. Poincare (Premier of France) has telegraphed the following message to Mr. Lloyd George: “I am anxious, in the name of the French Government, to express the assurances I have already given in my private capacity during friendly conversations on Saturday that France will be eager to take up in a most cordial spirit the examination of the various questions still at. issue between England and herself. I am firm in the hope that we shall succeed with mutual confidence in solving the problems in the best interests of our .countries. The French Government is a faithful interpreter of the wishes of Parliament and the people and I am convinced that both peoples, who were closely allied on the field of battle, should, with their common interest in the maintenance of peace in Europe, be able to assure the execution of the treaties they signed and reparation for the damage caused by invasion.” Mr. Lloyd George, replying to the telegram from M. Poincare, said: “My colleagues and I received with great satisfaction your cordial re-affirmation on behalf of the new French Government of the assurances we exchanged with His Majesty’s Goverment so recently outlined in the published documents. The policy of close co-opera-tion which they desire to maintain with France is such that repetition of their view is superfluous. Suffice it to say that we regard the safety of French soil against German aggression, the payment of reparation to France for her devastated areas and the steady maintenance of the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles as the common interests of the French and British peoples, which they must stand together to serve. We desire only, as we are glad to see you also desire, to settle the outtanding problems, so that nothing may impair the completeness of the Entente between our people and yours, and thus carry the comradeship of war into the higher task of bringing the European peoples together in a just and abiding peace.”— Ca'ble Assn.