20 MARCH 1953, Page 1

EGYPTIAN DEMANDS

Ill-considered statements to the Press can only hamper that smooth transition in the Sudan and the Canal Zone which is in the best interest of both Egypt and the Western Powers. It has been argued in some sort of extenuation of General Neguib's attack on British policy in the Sudan that the nerves of the General and his friends had been somewhat frayed by the tardiness of the British in opening talks on the other major matter of the evacuation of the Canal Zone. But it is difficult to see what excuse can be given for his further Press pronounce- ment this week that unconditional evacuation of the British from the Canal -Zone must be conceded before any questions of the subsequent defence of the Middle East can be discussed, or for Colonel Gamal Nasir's violent exaggeration of the same point. Yet there is no real evidence that General Neguib wishes to qualify it in any way. The talk of carrying on simultaneously arrangements for unconditional evacuation and fog new inter- national provision for. Middle East defence is mere specula- tion by non-Egyptians. But unless he does qualify it in action —for after all a statement to the Arabic Press is not quite the same thine as an unalterable policy—there is bound to be serious I;,•..ble. It is most unlikely that Mr. Churchill delayed the departure of General Slim for Australia in order that he might preside over the unconditional evacuation of the Canal Zone base. It is most unlikely that the United States, despite its great care not to get mixed up in Middle Eastern questions prematurely, will want to keep out of those questions for ever, or even to agree to some very doubtful intermediate period in which the defence of the Canal Zone is taken over by the Egyptian forces as best they can.