AIMS OF RUSSIA

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20132, 29 December 1939, Page 5

AIMS OF RUSSIA

STALIN DENOUNCED MR. WEBB'S OPINION Regret that the full text of his remarks bearing on the subject of Russia had not been recorded was expressed by the Minister of Labour, the Hon. P. C. Webb, when referring to a report of an address he had given at a meeting of trade unionists in Palmerston North. Mr. Webb said that when denouncing the imperialism of Stalin he had compared this with the attitude of Lenin and the latter’s declaration of antiimperialism, made soon after the Russian revolution, and which had been reproduced in some New Zealand papers just a few weeks ago. In this declaration Lenin had said that his Government stood four-square against all forms of imperialism and oppression of small peoples, and pledged itself to Finland and other small States to give them the right of self-deter-mination.

The Minister said that in referring to that declaration he had mentioned that if Lenin were alive to-day and could visit this country, he would say: "Well done, New Zealand: you are working out your own destiny along democratic lines.” He could not, however, say that of Stalin, whose Imperialist aims were a violation of the declaration made by Lenin in his day. "I said that Prussian imperialism was on a par with that of Hitler, and that both Stalin and Hitler should be treated as enemies of democracy,” added Mr. Webb. “1 take the strongest exception to Communists hailing Stalin no matter what Stalin does.”