April 16.
When Dr. Wellington Koo was appointed Chinese assessor to the Lytton Commission it would presumably have been pen to the Japanese Government or even the provisional administration operating in Manchuria to have registered objections to the apointment. Dr. Koo's former association with the regime of Marshal Chang Hsueh-liang might, for example, be a valid ground for such an objection. No such point appears to have foe en taken for, otherwise, the Commission would have made some reference on the subject to Ithe Chinese Government. Indeed Dr. Wellington Koo's own rela tions with his. Government had been so recently re-established that his selection, in spite of his lather obvious ' qualifications, by reason of his diplomatic experience and ability, came as something of a surprise. Having thus acquiesced in the attachment of Dr. Koo to the Commission, the Japanese author have been placed in an equi cal position by the reported pertinacity of Manchukuo's efforts to prevent Dr. Koo's entry into Manchuria, There is a sinister note in the Peking message which attributes Jon Reuter's authority, the conveyance of a veiled threat of violence towards the Chinese assessor. Japan has agreed to ithe inquiry now being conducted by the Lytton Commission. Her ability to protect its members, of whatever position or nationality, from untoward fneidents must be accepted without question. will be recognised that the new Manchakuo Government has Met yet shown itself free of the disabilities attaching to its various "provisional" predecessors set up since September last.
HE one with even.a bowing ac~ quaintance with Manchuria can be blind to the fact that its Jdependence on the good graces the Japanese military at BMukden is absolute. whose powers have, in the last few months, been considerably in excess of a purely advisory pacify in more than one direc tion in Manchuria. Diplomatileally Japan has not yet accorded the new Government formal recognition. It is not unfair to suggest that every effort will be made to ensure that! this latest handle to Japanese policy in that country does not "come off in the hand."
In plain English Dr. Welling ton Koo's safety can be secured if the Japanese military authori-rise are willing to secure it. At first the reports of the Manchukuo protest were taken as part of that irrepressibility generally to be discerned in infant administrations charged with the dificult task of flouting old ties and appearing to be independent while hugging new chains. The fact that Lord Lytton had been moved to vindicate the physical integrity of the Commission howed that there was something more serious afoot. Now at Geneva the Japanese. spokesmen have declared that the difficulty has mot been removed, even by Lord Lytton's announcement. It fg plain from the mystery of Count Uchida'é resignation and the announcement of the appointment of his successor, to the manifest annoyance of the War Office at Tokyo, that all is not well in Manchutia or with Manchoukuo, at the installation of whose new Government, Count Uchida was so prominent an assistant. It is to be hoped that the Japanese authorities will recognise how undesirable it is to impede the work of the Commission and that all apprehension for the safety of any of its members will be promptly removed.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.