GERMAN ITEMS

Hokitika Guardian, 16 October 1923, Page 2

GERMAN ITEMS

(ÜBTRALIAN AND N.Z. CABLE ASSOCIATION. -s' POSITION SERIOUS. UNEMPLOYED DRIVEN DESPERATE. (Reeo’ved this day at 9.0 a.m.) LONDON, October 15. The “Daily Express” special correspondent at Dusseldorf says that the situation in the Ruhr and Rhineland is rapidly approaching a point where the British and French troops will iiievitabilv be drawn into a bitter conflict , with the civil population if the country is to be saved from anarchy and complete destruction. Everywhere thousands of Communists and unemployed, driven desperate by sheer hunger and the want of winter clothing, have encaged in wholesale plunder. Over one hundred shops in Dusseldorf have been ransacked and nothing left- except a lew waxwork figures, standing amidst piles of broken glass from tlie shattered windows. The crowds ran wild, and hundreds of men and women went through the streets wearing all manner of new clothing. The correspondent saw scores of men discarding their own clothing in 'tho shops, into which they had smashed their way, calmly attiring themselves in complete new outfits. Some lelt. wearing two and three suits, one ovci the other, and carrying bundles homewards. The people raided the food stored like "hungry wolves and the pa-lice wero powerless to prevent them. The green police have been disbanded. Similar scenes were witness in nearly every Ruhr town. Mounted police were rushed to Solingen, in the British area, but our troops may be called on at any moment to charge the unemployed Germans. The French are standing by ready to assist the police in Dusseldorf but have been ordered not to interlere unless French and Allied inteiests are threatened. The- outlook is the blackest- and the unemployed already number a million.

MOW THE EMERGENCY POWERS BILL PASSED. LONDON, Oct. 15. A Berlin message states that the Socialist vote virtually carried the Emergency Powers Bill. Only hv the threat of expulsion did the Socialist leaders secure the support of thirty-one or more independent followers who were numerous enough to wreck tho v bill. These agreed to vote for tho hill solely to preserve party unity. It was known that their objections are based on the ground that the bill involves the abdication of parliamentary rights, hut they evidently concluded that tins was an occasion for sacrificing principle to party. The result of the vote is to place lierr Strcsemann in a stronger position to tackle the urgent problems confronting Government than if he had assumed dictatorial powers without Parliamentary sanction.

ALLIES IN AGBKEMKNT. GERMANY’S CAPACITY TO PAY. Received this day at 0.45 a.in.) LONDON, Oct. 15. The latest important move in the reparations impasse is by Britain, France and Italy who have agreed that a Reparations Commission shall j£xainine the problem of Germany’s capacity to pay on the basis of the proposals Belgium submitted in June, with a view to reconciling the Franco-Bri-tish standpoints. The proposals estimated that some three thousand millions of gold marks might he obtained annually from the exploitation of the railways, tobacco, liquor, sugar and other monopolies, deliveries in kind and a share in the German industrial profits. The announcement gains inreeased significance in view of Brussels giving ail authoritative statement that thcGerman industrialists in the Ruhr aiv coming forward in increasing numbers to negotiate for a resumption of work. The railwnymen are expected to resume on Wednesday. It is added that provisioning is assured throughout the occupied' terri-