U-BOATS FENCEDAIN

Hokitika Guardian, 11 July 1918, Page 3

U-BOATS FENCEDAIN

] THE NEW MINEFIELD. LONDON, May It>. ' To-morrow tho work of fencing in the North yea will bo so near completion that restrictions designed to limit the ■ operations of L r -boats and other enemy - '-.craft will bo put into force. Henceforth i all vessels, British, Allied, or neutral, - moving between our own coasts and i Norwegian territorial waters must obey regulations of a very stringent cliaraet- ! r or or take tho consequences, i The now minefields in this region aro . ■ tho most extensive ever laid. They 1 cover a triangular-shaped stretch of water nearly 22,000 square miles in I i area. As the base of this may bo taken a line drawn from the coast of Banffshire across to Norwegian waters, while the apex points for a considerable distance into the Atlantic. Within this zone lie the Orkneys and Shetlands. During the dark hours no ship will ho allowed to move inside it. Such as find themselves there between half an hour after sunset and half an hour before sunset must anchor under restrictions which forbid them from lying within a mile of the shore.

New pilotage regulations have been I issued for all ships going in and out of Cromarty or Inverness if they draw more than Bft of water. For the Orkneys an examination service has been instituted, which means that trading vessels and craft other than our warships will not be allowed there until they have been‘searched. No vessels may go in or out of Kirkwall except under strict regulations, and neutral craft of all kinds are forbidden to use (Shetland ports unless ordered there to be examined, when they would be under naval control. | Briefly put, our Navy has laid a strong, comprehensive grip upon the whole upper part of the North Sea between our own coasts and Norwegian waters in an endeavour to block in the ['-boats or any other enemy craft. < Both ends of the North Sea are now fenced in against the pirates, as it is well known 'that the Straits of Dover have been effectively barrnged for a long time past. The recent operations at Zeebrugge and Ostend were doubtless also part of the scheme of bottling up the U-boats, which must be greatly handicapped in the near future.

EXPELLED FROM PARIS.

“MANCHESTER GUARDIAN” CORRESPONDENT. PARIS, May 21.

The “ Temps” says:—“Air Robert Dell, the Paris correspondent of the “ Manchester Guardian,” received yesterday morning an order of expulsion and took train in the afternoon for Havre, on the way to England. He had lived among uh for 20 years and his daughter is married to a French officer now at the front.”

The reason for Mr Dell’s expulsion is his despatches concerning the Emperor Carl’s letters and his allegations concerning the French Government’s responsibility for the failure of the Austrian peace negotiations last year. The expulsion is the "sequel to the publication in the “ Afauchestor Guardian ” of what was in effect an attack upon President Poincare and AI. Rihot for preventing acceptance of the Emperor Carl’s proposal hv demanding the Alsace frontier of 1814. The “ Echo de Paris” on Friday last said: “ The English pacifists have printed the most lying narratives from a correspondent who for four years has been mixed up with the shadiest elements of French political life.