43
Throughout the Conference the Russian group maintained that Albania's war effort entitled her to full membership of the Conference. Albania was given every opportunity to present her case upon those .articles which concerned her, but her status as an " Allied and Associated Power" was not admitted. A Yugoslav amendment to Article 25, designed to give Albania the rights of an Allied and Associated Power, was rejected by 12 votes to the usual 6, with Ethiopia and France abstaining. Article 22 of the treaty awarded the Island of Saseno to Albania. Greece claimed that the island was Greek, and moved an amendment accordingly, but the original article was accepted in the Commission by 15 votes (including New Zealand) to 1 (Greece), with 4 abstentions (Australia, Belgium, Brazil, and South Africa). As a result of further discussion, it appeared to the New Zealand delegate and others that there had not been a sufficiency of information on this question, and the merits of the decision taken in Commission were open to doubt; New Zealand, therefore, abstained when the article was voted upon in full Conference. The article received only a simple majority of 13 votes to 2 (Greece and South Africa), with 6 abstentions (Australia, Belgium, Canada, China, Netherlands, New Zealand). ETHIOPIA By Articles 27 to 31 of the treaty, Italy was bound to recognize the sovereignty and independence of Ethiopia, to renounce any special rights or advantages she might have acquired in that country, and to make good some of the damage she had committed there. Italy claimed that credit should be allowed for certain of the economic assets which she had bequeathed to Ethiopia. The Ethiopian representative maintained, however, that the bulk of Italian installations in Ethiopia had been built for strategical reasons and their value was military rather than commercial; in any case, the roads and many of the buildings had been built with Ethiopian material and by Ethiopian workers. The Commission, naturally enough, favoured the Ethiopian case. Several amendments proposed by Ethiopia were accepted, including one which provided that the clauses of the treaty relating to Ethiopia should be applicable to all acts taken by Italy and Italian nationals since the beginning of their aggression in 1935. The date set by the draft treaty had been 1939. The Ethiopian claim to the possession of Italian diplomatic and consular buildings in Ethiopia, advanced on the ground that these had been misused for military purposes, was rejected, though 6 voted for the Ethiopian amendment (Byelo-Russia, Ethiopia, India, Poland, Yugoslavia, and Czechoslovakia) and 6 abstained (Australia, Canada, China, Greece, New Zealand, and the Netherlands).
Use your Papers Past website account to correct newspaper text.
By creating and using this account you agree to our terms of use.
Your session has expired.