Joint Foreign Committee Watches Jews’ Interests at Sth League Assembly

(Jewish Telegraphic Agency)

Lucien Wolf and J. M. Rich, were present during the Eighth Session of the Assembly of the League of Nations, in behalf of the Joint Foreign Committee, the Alliance Israelite Universelle and the Jewish Colonization Association.

Except in the matter of the Russian refugees, the Assembly and its various Commissions have not been directly concerned with any Jewish questions, but Mr. Wolf availed himself of the opportunity of discussing all pending Jewish and minorities questions with the officials of the Secretariat and the diplomatists who are attending the Assembly as delegates of their respective countries. Among the matters dealt with are the qualifications of candidates for membership on the Council, the procedure for giving effect to the League’s guarantees of the minorities treaties, the problem of the Staatenlose, the Roumanian memorandum on the Jewish question, the grievances of the Jews of Salonika and the numerus clausus law in Hungary.

On the first and the last of these questions, Mr. Wolf presented formal notes to the Secretariat. The first took the form of a renewal of the application made by the Joint Foreign Committee on September 13, 1926 for certain amendments to the regulations governing the election of new members of the council, the object being to render ineligible states in default in their obligations under the minorities treaties. Attention was drawn to the note in the official journal of the assembly on September 10, 1927 and copies were circulated among all the members.

With regard to the numerus clausus, Mr. Wolf called attention to the nonobservance by Hungary of the pledge given to the Council by Count Klebelsberg on December 12, 1925 and expressed the opinion that the matter should be reconsidered by the Council with a view to a definite pronouncement on the legality of the Numerus Clausus Law.

On the Salonika question a prolonged conference took place with M. Michalokopoules, the Greek Minister of Foreign Affairs, and it was agreed that the Greek Cabinet should immediately take the Jewish grievances into their consideration. A full report on these and other questions will be presented to the Joint Foreign Committee as soon as Mr. Wolf returns to London, Mr. Wolf also attended the meetings of the Consultative Committee on Refugees of the International Labor Office and the International Conference of Private Organizations for the Protection of Migrants, where he represented the Jewish Colonization Association and Mr. Rich the Foreign Committee.