17 SEPTEMBER 1932, Page 2

Peaceful Manchukuo The kidnapping of two English residents of Yingkow,

a town of Manchukuo, by bandits, followed by two massed attacks on trains, is an instructive comment on Japan's repeated assurances that her action of last September, which began the whole Manchurian trouble, was designed solely to restore order in a bandit.. ridden province and that the status quo would be restored as soon as that had been achieved. Manchuria Of thirteen months ago was a place of peace and security as compared with Manchukuo to-day. But this, of course, is a transition period. The Japanese plan is being worked out with method and precision. Diplomatic recognition of the new State by Tokyo is an accomplished fact and Japan is now setting herself to delay the publication of the Lytton Report, urg?4ig that it shall not see the light till the Japanese Government has had an opportunity of sub- mitting observations on it, for which purpose a period of six weeks is required. If that right is accorded to Japan it must obviously be accorded to China too, but there is no good reason why it should be accorded at all. There was procrastination enough about the appointment of the Lytton Commission, and over a year will have elapsed before authentic information about facts which ought to have been enquired into within a month reach Geneva. Secret reports invariably leak out bit by bit, as this one is doing already. Prompt publication now is on all grounds to be desired.

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