ALGERIAN CRISIS

Press, Volume C, Issue 29504, 4 May 1961, Page 15

ALGERIAN CRISIS

Bourguiba Hopeful

(N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) WASHINGTON. May 3. President Habib Bourguiba, of Tunisia, who will arrive in Washington today, expressed optimism about a settlement of the Algerian crisis in his talks In Ottawa yesterday with the Canadian Prime Minister (Mr Diefcnbaker) United Press International reported. Later he told a press conference in Ottawa that he was still available to help solve the problems arising out of the long war in Algeria. The Tunisian President said Algeria’s extremist French colonists were assisting infiltration of North Africa by international communism in their attitude towards an independent Algeria. “I am still quite willing to offer my services in order to overcome those difficulties,” the President said at the conference at the end of his two-day Canadian visit. Reuter said that President Bourguiba’s 10-day visit to the United States would bring American attention on North Africa after weeks of preoccupation with Southeast Asian problems. He will fly to the American capital from Ottawa aboard President Kennedy's official aircraft. At his Ottawa press conference he said the extension of the war in Algeria, through the attitude of the French settler extremists, was "playing into the hands of the Communists. It also makes interference in North Africa by international communism much easier." President Kennedy was considered certain to seek an early opportunity to get a first-hand version from President Bourguiba on last week’s abortive military coup in Algiers.