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Show 'LITTLE NATIONS ARE ! WARNED BY HUGHES cessation of HOSTILITIES DE- I MANDED IN FIRST ACTION ' BY NEW GOVERNMENT. Suggestion of Mediation Is Conveyed to Panama and Costa Rica in Warning Issued by Secretary of State. Washington. Cestui ion of hostilities hostili-ties between Costa ltica and Panama is demanded in notes which, it was learned at the stale department, had been dispatched on March f to the governments of those two countries by Charles 10. Hughes, new secretary oi state. This act'on was the first of the Harding administration in the realm of foreign affairs nntf was said to have been based on the ground of broad expediency, as. the dispute between be-tween ttie Central American republics involved American interests in the : i'anaman canal zone. " ' A peaceful solution of the dispute over Coto on the basis of the White award is understood to have been suggested. sug-gested. The notes did not suggest mediation by the United Slates, but were understood to have conveyed the impression that this country stood ready to enforce, if necessary, a peaceful peace-ful solution. Dispatch of the notes followed conferences con-ferences between President Harding, Secretary Hughes and John W. Weeks and Edwin Denby, new secretaries of war and navy. Mr. Hughes took up the subject of the dispute with Undersecretary Under-secretary Davis immediately after his induction into office and later spent nearly two hours with Mr. Harding. Secretary Weeks was called in soon after the conference began and presented pre-sented latest dispatches from fhe canal zone. Mr. Denby discussed, the question later with the president. Iteplies from Panama .and Costa Rica to the notes dispatched several clays ago by former Secretary Colby were received Sunday. , That from Panama was said to have expressed a willingness to accept the offer of the United States in attempting to settle the dispute, but the one from Costa. Paca was described as unsatisfactory. It was said that the American government gov-ernment had no official information that either Panama or Costa Rica intended in-tended to submit the dispute to the league of nations, as reported in press dispatches. Saturday's action of the state department, it was added, was taken without reference to such reports. |