SPARTACIST STAND

Hokitika Guardian, 8 June 1920, Page 3

SPARTACIST STAND

A STRIKE THREAT. '

CONSERVATISM WANING

BERLIN, March 29. Street agitators, Junker officers, and Bolshevist mob leaders have yielded the J)crlin stage for tile moment to political Wire-pullers, and'the last two days have been taken up by lobby intrigues between the various parties for the formation of the new Cabinet which is to carry • on. the Government till the election. Ope fact is established more clearly than- any other: as she approaches the I decisive stage of the con Act between'the principles of Communism.and Conservatism Germany has no statesmen of the latter party with any conspicuous influence on the country. The political landslide towards the ' Left may hot be manifested by the formation of the new Ministry, but tbe / Moderate (socialist organ f‘ Vorwarts” makes common cause with the Spartncists agaipst the Right, and Germany Is being rapidly Radicalised. Representatives of 1,000 workmen’s) councils have sent a note to Herr Bauer, the ex-Premier, in which they threaten a resumption of the general strike unless immediate steps arc taken to disarirk all the “ bourgeois ” in the State, hand over their weapons to the workers, and establish a National Soviet, • 1 The present Administration is doing practically nothing to assure its popularity by enprgetic action against the Junker rebels, but it has started a blood feud with the working classes by allowing Government troops to continue summary execution's of alleged Bolshevists until Within the last 48 hours. In the Ruhr area, ,where a Spnrtaeist revolution is going on, armed forces of ) Reds demand the continuance of the

' struggle and no negotiations with the Central Government. They have confiscated bank balances and all food' supplies; ,

RUNNING TROOPS SHOT. Reports of fighting between the State militia and the Sparticists in the industrial . township of Remcheid, near , Elberfeld, on the border of the British occupied area, show that a’ bloodthirsty civil war prevailed there. As, Government troops fled for protection to the British lifies they were massacred. The Remscheid correspondent of the “ Lokal Anzieger ” says : ‘f It was not a fight', it was murder, murder, murder! 7 Widespread police measures have been carried put jto-ebry against foreigners in Germfjiiy. All unable tp prove their by official papers were arrested. * Tile aim of tips cpmbing out js to get bold pf tho many Russian Bolshevist agi- . tntprs whose presence in Germany became Ijpown during the recept (fisturbjipces. Ritssiaps ar u sajd tp prpvjde the " rhost fanatical fighters among the Spur-, tncist forces ofj the Ruki\ Captain Bojcke, brother of a famous unman killed in. flip war, is on the staff of the Rod 1 Army ip front pf Wesel.

Seventy-seven dead and many hundreds of wounded are* official figures of the losses during last week’s fighting at Kjel. Dresden had more than half as pianv casualties also. JUNKER OFFICERS BLOWN UP. Captain von Rfluk Harttwng, one of flip Lest known of thje many yrupg Junker officers wh.o since the war have'organised their own troop formations with the' militia, which they cynpnand in a jSemirfeudal way, was killed yesterday,

apparently by assassination. He was starting jh his motpr-car with two * 1 guests, a map and a woman, hack to Berlin from Lis headquarters in the suburbs.There was alsp an aymed’pscort pf twp spldjers. A tprrific explosion occurred; apd blow the car to pieces before it set pff, Ho and one of the guard were killed and the other people were injured, as were also 8 soldiers watching the start. It is supposed that Communists whose local leaders he had had arrested blew up thb car wjtli a bojnb,