BRITAIN & JAPAN

Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 August 1939, Page 6

BRITAIN & JAPAN

POSITION REACHED IN TALKS AT TOKIO STATEMENT BY FOREIGN OFFICE. LOCAL & OTHER ISSUES. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 11.58 a.m.) RUGBY, August 20. A statement clarifying the position reached in the Tokio talks has been issued by the Foreign Office. It is .stated that it was agreed on Juno 27, as a result of an exchange of views between Britain and Japan that conversations should take place in Tokio in order to effect a settlement of various questions relating to present conditions in Tientsin. At the outset. Japan expressed the that it was essential to recognise the background against which the situation in Tientsin should be viewed. In order to meet this view, Britain agreed upon a formula in which Britain fully recognised the actual situation in China, where largescale hostilities are in progress, and noted that as long as that state of affairs continued to exist the Japanese forces in China had special requirements for the purpose of safeguarding their own security. Under this formula, Britain also declared that she had no intention to countenance any act or measures prejudicial to the attainment of their specified objects by the Japanese force.

The Foreign Office statement adds that a majority of the proposals advanced by Japan as a basis of discussion at the Tokio talks referred to police matters and closer Anglo-Jap-anese co-operation for maintaining law and order and Britain had now made considerable progress towards agreement. subject to a final settlement on certain points of detail. In addition to proposals on police matters, Japan also put forward proposals relating to the prohibition of the Chinese national currency within the Concession at Tientsin and the removal of certain silver reserves from Tientsin and the diplomatic quarter of Peking. It was at once apparent to Britain that the scope'of these proposals was not confined to purely local issues at Tientsin and it also became clear, as a result of a careful scrutiny of the position, that Britain could not, even if she wished, conclude a bilateral agreement which might affect the position of other Powers without the consent of those Powers. Accordingly. Britain intimated to Japan that no discussions on the economic proposals advanced by the latter could, in Britain’s view, lead to any useful result on a purely Anglo-Japanese basis. Britain, however, expressed her willingness to examine the position afresh, provided the interests of all parties could be safeguarded. JAPANESE CLAIMS BRITISH ATTITUDE CALLED CONTRADICTORY. OBJECTION TO DISCUSSING NINE POWER TREATY. (Received This Day. 12.10 p.m.) TOKIO, August 20. A Japanese Foreign Office statement, recalling the issues of the AngloJapanese conference, reiterates that the Japanese demands do not exceed the scope of conference, for which reason the refusal to discuss banking, currency silver and other questions because they are not local at Tientsin is not justified. Britain at the outset of the conference did not intend to exclude economic questions. She now contradictorily contends they should be solved in relation to the ultimate settlement of the Sino-Japanese dispute. Japan does not comprehend how a discussion of the Nine Power Treaty can be useful in settling the Tientsin issues and will never admit the intervention of a third Power, which would only lead to delays and complications.