§ Mr. Manderasked the Prime Minister whether, at the present session of the League of Nations Council, the British Government propose to report recent measures taken to secure the peace of Europe with Poland, Rumania, Greece, and Turkey with a view to their recognition as a contribution to the collective security contemplated under the Covenant?
§ The Prime MinisterMy Noble Friend made a statement to the Council of the League of Nations yesterday, as follows:
Text of Statement by Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs to Council of League of Nations. May 23rd.
I have asked permission to make a short statement on the general political situation because I desired to explain briefly the view which His Majesty's Government take of recent events in Europe and of their future attitude to the League of Nations.
The changes which have taken place in Europe since last September are present to all our minds. It is not necessary for the representative of His Majesty's Government to restate their attitude towards these events, nor is this the occasion to discuss them in detail.
But they have imposed upon His Majesty's Government a certain course of action, on which I ought to say a word or two. We have in consequence of what has passed felt obliged to undertake certain obligations of a particular character directed towards specific and well-defined ends. One principle is common to all these obligations that we have assumed; namely, resistance to the imposition of solutions by the method of force, which if continued, must result in reducing civilisation to anarchy and destruction.
The particular action which His Majesty's Government have taken has not been carried out through the League. This was in the circumstances impossible. But everything that His Majesty's Government have done is in strict conformity with the spirit of the League Covenant. The negotiations on which His Majesty's Government are engaged are not yet completed. When they are, His 2304W Majesty's Government will propose to take an appropriate opportunity for communicating their result to the League.
This is not the occasion for detailed discussion of the events to which I have alluded, but there will, I think, be general agreement that they have inevitably affected the political influence and activity of the League. It could not be otherwise, and we should be less than frank with ourselves and with the world if we refused to acknowledge the fact. But I should like to make it clear that His Majesty's Government hold no less strongly than they have ever done to the ideals of international collaboration of which the League has been and is the symbol. I am glad to think that many nations who are not members of the League are still fully alive to the great value of all the work that is done for the welfare of humanity through the labour, health, social or other technical organisations of the League. Moreover, the great end and purpose, in loyalty to which the League was founded, and to which it has sought to give expression, transcends any organisation or outward form. That purpose can never fade or die, whatever may be the practical methods adopted for giving to it at any particular moment practical expression. All members of the League will look forward to the day when all nations may be able and willing to work together in the ways of peace for the common good of all. His Majesty's Government will in the meantime so far as possible frame their policy, not only to defend our present order against forcible disruption, but more positively to revive those elements on which the re-establishment of international co-operation in a comprehensive, vigorous and practical form depends.