GERMAN CONTENTION

Marlborough Express, Volume LXXVI, Issue 247, 20 October 1942, Page 3

GERMAN CONTENTION

BARBARITY TOWARDS PRISONERS.

P.A. Cable.

LONDON, Oct. 18.

"The British War Office's denial that German war prisoners taken at Dieppe had their hands tied, and the British Government's statement that one of the prisoners brought back to England had his hands tied, have been proved deliberate falsehoods," says a German High Coinmand statement in reference to the chaining of prisoners of war. The High Command quoted sworn statements from Germans who, it is alleged, were bound, and emphasised that it was ready to allow the protective Power to check the statements. The British Government was off the point in its replies in invoking Article 2 of the Geneva Convention. "The British have violated the convention by their treatment of German prisoners at Dieppe and Sark," it said. Referring to an alleged British broadcast on October 9 that Britain intended to treat all Axis prisoners alike, the statement says: "The German Government sees itself compelled to reconsider Allied prisoners of war taken on all fronts as one unit. Therefore, inhuman treatment of German prisoners of war in any war theatre, for instance, on the Russian front, will in future have to be paid for by Allied war prisoners, without distinction of nationality.'' "GANG WARFARE" IN CRETE. The statement then gave the text of an alleged British document ordering Axis prisoners of war to move

mines and also declared that the Allies often fired on shipwrecked Germans. "Englishmen, Australians and New Zealanders in guerilla battles in Crete repeatedly violated the fundamental principles of warfare and behaved, not like soldiers, but like convicts," it said. "Gang warfare in Crete assumed fearful forms. Captain John Pendlebury, British Vice-Consul at Heraklion, carried out the rnain preparations for this gang warfare. Pendlebury's diary provided evidence that he knew his actions contravened international law." The statement concluded: "The British War Office, under pressure of German reprisals, has twice promised to revoke the orders which contravene international law, but the British Government makes inendacious statements in order to avoid German reprisals, intending in future to apply the same barbaric measures against prisoners. These reasons have prompted the High Command this time to take reprisals."