An appeal for a Memorial Fund for the completion of the humanitarian work of the late Dr. Fridtjof Nansen, who died a year ago, has been issued here by members of the League of Nations Council, M. Briand, Dr. Julius Curtius, Signor Grandi, Mr. Arthur Henderson, and famous statesmen like President Masaryk, Lord Cecil of Chelwood, M. Venizelos, the Greek Prime Minister and Dr. Mowinckel, the former Prime Minister of Norway.
Dr. Fridtjof Nansen acted for ten year’s as High Commissioner of the League of Nations, first for the Repatriation of Prisoners of War, and later for the Protection and Assistance of Refugees, the appeal says. During the whole of that period, he gave his time and strength to the service of the League without reserve. By his unwearied labour, and thanks to his courage, his perseverance and his organising power, he repatriated nearly half–a-million Prisoners of War belonging to more than thirty different nations, and helped to make tolerable the lot of over 1,250,000 Greek, 1,000,000 Russian, 300,000 Armenian, and some tens of thousands of Assyrian, Assyro-Chaldean, Bulgarian, and Turkish refugees.
When Dr. Nansen died his work was unfinished. There remain a considerable number of refugees who need protection and assistance. To complete the work further funds are now required for which the Tenth Assembly of the League had authorised Dr. Nansen to appeal to the charitable public of the world. This appeal would have been issued by Dr. Nansen during the summer of 1930, but for his untimely death. It contained a programme such as the making of advances for agricultural colonisation, the finding of and transport to employment, the establishment of various other relief measures, which would enable the whole of the material part of the refugee problems to be liquidated finally by the end of 1939. We appeal with confidence for contributions to the Memorial Fund to enable the whole of the material part of the refugee problems to be liquidated finally by the end of 1939. We appeal with confidence for contributions to the Memorial Fund to enable the Nansen International Office for Refugees to finish the work which he began. Donations may be earmarked for any particular aspect of the Armenian Russian or other refugee relief work.
The Jewish Community owe a deep debt of gratitude to Dr. Nansen, the late Mr. Lucien Wolf, who was closely associated with him in his work, wrote in a statement to the J.T.A. at the time of Dr. Nansen’s death. In the many Jewish aspects of the refugee problem which came before the Advisory Commission, we always found Dr. Nansen the kindest and most energetic of friends. He kept a watchful eye on the outlets for emigration in the interests of all the refugees, and on several occasions, at the instance of the Joint Foreign Committee and the Ica, intervened personally to keep the door open in South America. He was also of great assistance during the crisis of 1921-23, when the Polish and Roumanian Governments became restive at the congestion of Russo-Jewish refugees in their frontier provinces. When the Polish Government threatened to expel the refugees, his intervention resulted in the withdrawal of the threat. He was equally helpful when the Roumanian Government ordered the deportation of the Jewish refugees from Bessarabia, sending an energetic protest to Bucharest, which was immediately followed by the withdrawal of the decree. He intervened with good effect on behalf of the foreign Jewish students in the Austrian Universities when they were threatened with exclusion from various privileges, and when the agitation against Schechita in Norway assumed a serious form he brought all his great influence to bear on the Government to obtain a solution which would be just to the Jewish Community.
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