RECONSTRUCTION IN SOVIET

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 24898, 11 June 1946, Page 5

RECONSTRUCTION IN SOVIET

WAR DEVASTATION IN BYELORUSSIA

LONDON, June 9 Anyone who talks of a next war should be gaoled. You have seen what war has done to our republic, so you can understand why it is ridiculous to’ think that we want another war,” said the Foreign Minister of Byelorussia (Mr Kuzmo Kiselev) speaking in Moscow to a party of correspondents who were the first to visit Byelorussia to see how the work of UNRRA is progressing there. Mr Kiselev said that Byelorussia still had 2,000,000 peasants without homes and hundreds of thousands were living in dugouts in towns. Three-quarters of Minsk the capital of the republic, was a pile of rubble. Mr Kiselev explained that reconstruction work was moving slowly because of the completeness of the Germans’ wrecking, the lack of equipment and building materials, and the shortage of manpower. One of the most urgent needs was tractors, of which the Germans stole 8000.

“Everywhere there is a grim panorama of shattered towns and a blighted countryside.” seys Reuter’s correspondent. “The restoration to normal according to officials, will take from 15 to 20 years.” The correspondent of the Associated Press at Minsk reports that electric power plants from Britain, tinned meats from Canada, and clover seed from Czechoslovakia are included in an UNRRA shipment which has arrived at Minsk. An additional 20.000 tons of goods is on the way.