The League of Nations

- The League and the Settlement of Macedonia

SOME of the more enthusiastic but less discerning, supporters of the League of Nations are apt to stress the idealism of

that organization, or rather their own aspirations as to what the League might do, and to regard all who do not believe

that it can immediately put an end to all wars and rumours of wars as wicked eYnies.- On the other hand they usually fail to explain or dwell on other activities of the League which really have helped to improve the lot of suffering humanity.

MACEDONIA'S MIXED POPULATION.

We have heard very little of the admirable work done by the League and through the League to settle the Greek refUgees in Macedonia ; yet that is one of its most striking successes, which hai a bearing far exeeeding mere humani- tarianism, and which will undoubtedly contribute very materially to the peace of the world. Greek Macedonia is one of the most fertile areas in Europe, espeeially the country between and along the valleys of the Vardar and the Struma. The port of Sidonica is well sheltered and connected by. rail with various parts of the interior. The waterfalls of Vodena are capable of generating a considerable amount of electric power. But the population, although by no means dense, was hopelessly mixed, composed as it was of Greeks, MOsleins, Bulgarians, ' Albanians, ' Jews, Kutzo' Vlachs, &c., all these heterogeneous elements bitterly hostile to each other. The very admixture of races provided some. justification for the territorial aspirations of the various neighbouring States and thiis kept the"country in a state, of endemic turnioil. For close on 1,500 years Macedonia has been in this condition, and in the last fifty or sixty years it has been a peril to European peace and has indeed provoked more than one war. - After the Balkan Wars of 1912-13' Southern Macedonia was assigned to Greece,..but this did not bring peace. The Greeks were then by no means in a. majority, and the other races were anything but satisfied with the change of regime, while the new frontiers proved detrimental to economic developinent. The' World War was, indeed, the only really. peaceful period in the history of MacedOnia, for, apart from the narrow. fighting line the peasants could fOr "the first. time cultivate their fields undis- turbed . . turbed and be sure of getting good Priees for their crops, and the country Was,. for the first time, wholly free of brigandage. It was good to see the cultivated area of Mace- - donia steadily extend between 1917 and 1919. The post-War, period, however, saw a revival of brigandage, political trouble and uncertaintY.

INFLUX OF GREEK REFUGEES.

- Then- came' the -Greek catastrophe in September, 1922; and the sudden influx of masses of Greek refugees' froin Anatolia into the restricted territory of the Kingdom:. Yet this apparently irreparable 'dilaster proved a _ blessing in' disguise.- The League of Nations 'had already 'dealt success- fully` with the refugee problem elsesihere, and immediately=

after the debacle in Anatolia Greece

a it sent Dr. Nansen to Gree to examine the situation. In February, 1923, the Greek. Government requested the Council of the League - to lend its moral support and technical assistance to deal with the refugee problem. A financial and a technical- commission went out to Greece to study the possibilities of a loan- and prepare a plan of refugee settlement. In June, 1923, the Financial Committee of the League presented a report setting . forth the conditions under. which a loan for refugee settlement . might be floated. The Protocol, draNin up -by the Greek committee of the Council, .fixed the amount which Greece Was authorized to issue at £10,000,000, and the Greek GOVern- ment assigned certain revenue to its service. . In December, 1924, an international loan at 7 • per cent. was floated and subscribed many times over. The proceeds amounted to £9,970,000, and by September, 1928, £9,515,000 had, been . spent, of which £8,229,000 had been devoted to agricultural settlement. Had it not been for" the recommendations of the -League commission• and its moral support it would have - been very difficult for Greece to have -raised .a loan on such favourable terms, if at - all. It must be added that this sum by no means represents the whole financial effort of Greece, as the Government has also spent large sums out of its own resources on refugee settlement.

The Protocol further provided for the formation of an autonomous settlement commission, to which the Greek Government assigned some 500,000 hectares of land to be distributed by the commission among the refugees. The commission consists of four members, two appointed by the

League Council, one of whom, the chairman, is a citizen of the United States, and two- by the Greek Government. It has a central headquarters, a financial, an urban and an agricultural department ; the local officials are nearly all -Greeks, appointed by the Greek Ministry of Agriculture. SETTLING THE NEW GREEKS.

The total number of refugees is not accurately known, but amounts to.albout 1,500,000, of whom 1,000,000 came from

Anatolia-. Of this total a certain 'number eventually left the country and others were able to find occupation without assistance, but some 1,200,000 had to be provided for by the

commission. The bulk of the land assigned to it was Obtained as a result of the exchange of population between Greece and Turkey and to a small extent between Greece and Bulgaria.

Up to now the commission has settled about 143,000 families on the soil, most of them in Macedonia, but a certain number also in Western Thrace, Epirus, Thessaly, &c. The settlers have been provided with dwellings, livestock, machinery and implements, seed-fertilizers and water supply.

ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL PROGRESS.

The results of the work have been of a two-fold nature—; economic and political, Wheat production has more than doubled in four years, while the total cereal crop has increased by 50 per cent. ; the import of wheat on the other hand has diminished by about 25 per cent. The tobacco crop, a particularly valuable one for Macedonia, which comprises.

in the Kavalla district one of the best tobacco-producing 'Areas in the world; has more than doubled. Many new crops have

also been introduced. -The total cultivated area throughout

Greece has almost doubled in three or four years. Cultivation' in general has improved,r the intensive forms replacing the

extensive method. The political results are 'hardly less im-

portant, as we can see from one of the maps contained in the League Report On refugee-settlement: In what is now Greek

Macedonia, before the war of 1912, out of a total of 1,205,000 inhabitants only 42.6 per cent. were Greeks, while 39.4 per cent. were Moslems, 9.9 per cent. Bulgarians and 8.1 per cent. miscellaneous. In 1926 the total had grown to 1,511,000, of which 88.8 per cent. were Greeks, 0:1 per cent. Moslems, 5.1 per . cent. Bulgarians, and 6 per cent. miscellaneous. This _

alteration in the relative proportions of the various ethnic elements of the pOpUlation, although- it" may have involved - hardship while in progress, has unquestionably made for pacilleation ; Greek Macedonia is to-day a really Greek' country, white Anatolia is a purely Turkish One, and thus one ' great cause of international ill-feeling in the Near East has been eliminated. This result too would have been unattainable without the intervention of the League.