UNDER AXIS INFLUENCE.

Evening Star, Issue 24328, 17 October 1942, Page 4

UNDER AXIS INFLUENCE.

Horn Argentina ami Chile are determined apparently to maintain good relations with the Axis. Their attitude creates grave difficulties for the United Nations, for in both countries espionage and intrigue on behalf of the enemy Powers are rampant. The result, in the words of Air Sumner Welles, American Under-Secretary of State, is that other American republics are being stabbed in the back by enemy agents who arc operating freely within the borders of the two countries mentioned. According to this Minister, enemy submarines are taking a heavy toll of ships and men serving under the flags of American countries, both north and south, in the surrounding seas. Eighteen other American nations stand firmly behind the United States. The Foreign Office in each of the two States mentioned Iras protested to Washington against the allegations made by Mr Welles, but it is certain that be would not have made them unless they were based on indisputable evidence. What ho said was subsequently supported by a declaration in New York, emanating from informed quarters, which asserted that there was positive and unimpeachable evidence that the Argentine Government recently took drastic steps to protect Nazis from counter-action by private citizens. Argentina is the worst offender, and its President (Dr Castillo) has very thinly disguised his pro-Axis sympathies, though it is claimed that throughout the State there is a strong feeling in favour of the democracies. The root of the trouble is that in Argentina and Chile large sections of the population are of German, Italian, and Spanish origin, and these provide abundant opportunities for underground Axis activities which are stimulated by financial assistance. In particular it is reported that Spanish ships, which are immune from attacks by Allied submarines, are carrying to Latin America individuals in the Axis pay whose business, by bribery and other corrupt methods, is to work for the enemy against the democracies.