THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS: At Geneva

The Assembly of the League of Nations, in session for the sixth time at Geneva (TIME, Sept. 21), turned and gave ear to Count Quinones de Leon of Spain. By him

A Spanish Resolution was introduced (with the approval of France and the consent of England) praising the efforts of League members to make “regional security treaties,” such as the proposed Rhine Pact. Count Quinones’ words and resolution were innocuously bland. Specifically he proposed that when regional security pacts had been drawn up by the interested parties the League “should examine them, in order to report to the Seventh [next] Assembly on the progress of security.” In essence the intention of the Count was to lay a flower on the grave of the Protocol, (TIME, Sept. 21) which was once to have given the League power to dictate “security” to Europe.

For a moment the resolution seemed upon the point of passing; the vexed question of “disarmament” was to be shelved again. Then up rose Count Apponyi, that lean Hungarian statesman, a grand seigneur of legend, whose pointed white beard, flaring Roman nostrils, and face of parchment, give him, when he is solemn, the air of an exiled patriarch, and, when he laughs, that of a goat. He swept the conclave with proud and sombre eyes. Twisting a little paper in his hand he began to speak.

With an unexpectedness that was as unnerving as a thunderclap he twisted the tail of Senor Quinones’ butterfly resolution into a hornet’s sting; proposed an amendment that would give the League power to make “regional compacts” binding on the whole world, with a force as rigid as that once contemplated in drawing up the Protocol.

The assembly gasped. Dean of mid-European statesmen that he is, the aged Count Apponyi fired home an address in support of his measure that was calculated to leave not a mind unpersuaded. The assembly rose to its feet and cheered. Then it suddenly sat down and realized it had made a faux pas. Throughout the rest of the week the mills of Britannia slowly ground Count Apponyi’s resolution to nothingness. The hour for “putting teeth into the League” was not yet.

Its moment of drama past, the assemblage proceeded as follows:

Economic Conference. M. Louis Toucheur, last year a champion of the Protocol, introduced a resolution calling upon the League to call a conference which should investigate and attempt to mitigate economic factors making for war. It will be debated and passed upon later.

A Conciliation Court resolution, introduced by the Danes, and pro-viding for the establishment of an auxiliary to the World Court, through whose hands all disputes between nations would have to pass, was knocked on the head by the British, Brazilians, Dutch and French.

Mosul.* Turkey’s demand that a plebiscite be taken to settle the Mosul frontier, (TIME, Sept. 21), and the declaration by Tewfik Bey that Turkey would not consider herself bound to accept the decision of the Council of the League in the matter, unless based on such a plebiscite, led to interminable recriminations between Britain and Turkey. Britannia contended that she and Turkey were mutually bound to accept the decision of the League, and that the Turks were playing false at Geneva, and were also kidnapping Christians across the disputed frontier. Verliage piled up until in desperation the League Council proposed that an advisory opinion as to its power to adjust the matter be asked of the Permanent Court of International Justice at the Hague.

Meanwhile, Tewfik Bey, swarthy, gold-toothed, spectacled, was openly menaced by L. C. M. S. Amery, the British Colonial Minister without mincing words, Mr. Amery declared that Turkey had broken faith with Britain and the League; and that, unless Turkey was prepared to about face and keep her word, Britain would consider herself to nobody in the matter. It was practically a threat to settle the frontier by force. Tewfik was “flabbergasted.” For the moment the matter rested, pregnant with menace.

-Mosul is the centre of a district on both sides of the Tigris river, comprising the site of ancient Nineveh, and abutting at the north upon what was formerly Armenia, but is now, thanks to the Lausanne Treaty, a province of Turkey; while at the east and south is the Kingdom of Iraq, a temporary British protectorate. The “Mosul frontier” between Iraq and Turkey was sketched provisionally by the Council of the League at Brussels last year. And Fethy Bey was understood to have agreed for Turkey to abide by that frontier until the League should make investigations and set a definite new fron-tier, which should be binding upon England-protected-Iraq and Turkey. England’s interest in the matter arises from the fact that she can exploit the oil fields of Iraq, while administering her protectorate.