BRITISH EFFORTS FOR PEACE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 September 1939, Page 6

BRITISH EFFORTS FOR PEACE

Reviewed by Mr Chamberlain PLAIN WARNING TO GERMANY RECALLED PUBLICATION OF CORRESPONDENCE (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 1 p.m.) RUGBY, September 1. Commencing his statement in the House of Commons the Prime Minister (Mr Neville Chamberlain) said: “I do not propose to say many words tonight. The time has come when, action rather than speech is required. Eighteen months ago, in this house, I prayed that the responsibility might not fall upon me to ask this country to accept the awful arbitratment of war. I fear 1 may not be able to avoid that responsibility, but at any rate I cannot wish for conditions in which such a burden should fall upon me clearer tlutn they are today as to where my duty dies. No man can say that the government could have done more to try keep open the way for. an honourable and equitable settlement of the dispute between Germany and Poland, nor have we neglected any means of making it crystal clear to Germany that if she insisted on using force again in the’ manner in which she used it in the past, we were resolved to oppose her by force. “I would like to thank the House for the forbearance which it has shown on two recent occasions in not demanding from me information which members recognise I could not give while these negotiations were still in progress. I have now had all the correspondence with Germany put into the form of a White Paper. On account of difficulties, lam afraid there are but few copies available, but I understand they will be coming in in relays while the House is sitting. I do not think it necessary to refer in detail now to these documents, which are already past history. They make it perfectly clear that our object has been to try to bring about discussions about the Polish-German disputes between the two countries themselves, on terms of equality, the settlement to be. one. which safeguarded the,independence of Poland and which secured its due observance by international guarantees.” ,