RUSSIA.

Taihape Daily Times, 10 December 1917, Page 5

RUSSIA.

•WHAT ARE THE ALLIES FIGHT-

ING TOR.

TROTSKY WANTS TO KNOW.

LONDON, December 7.

Wircless Russian Official.— Trotsky lias issued a Note inviting the Allies, before December 12th, to state their willingness or refusal, to participate in negotiations for an armistice and peace. In the event of refusal the Allies must declare clearly and publicly the aims for which the war is being prolonged for a fourth year. Meanwhile the formal armistice is unsigned. ALLIES LOANS TO BE REPUDI ATED . LONDON, December 8. The Daily Chronicle's Petrograd correspondent states that Germany's curt treatment of the Bolshevik negotiators has caused the Bolsheviks to vent.their chagrin on the Allies. Lenin has threatened to force the Allies to their knees by declaring Russia bankrupt. A decree published announces the annulment of foreign loans and 'the cessation of the payment of interest thereon. In the meantime various sectors are arranging local armistices. They have already drafted an agreement with . Prince Leopold's group fixing a neutral zone between the entanglements whore soldiers may : meet unarmed. All military operations have ceased. The Constituent Assembly meets on the 11th, The Bolsheviks have made decrees abolishing the Law Courts and lawyers, and substituting revolutionary tribunals.

A SAD STORY.

PETEOGRAD, December 8

Britain has notified the Bolsheviks that she does not intend to repatriate Chitcherin or Petroff (two Eussians interned in England.) Soldiers and sailors disarmed thel guard of the ex-Emperor at Tobolsk, and arrested the commander of the guard, The people's • Commissiaries state that they intend to remove Nicholas fearing that he may be lynched. iSoldiers returning from the front are pillaging small towns and States and are carrying out Jewish progroms. The number of unemployed in Petrograd is increasing daily. There are now 400,000. At least a million more are unemployed in Moscow and other large towns. • It is reported that Germany is prepared to make peace with Russia without an indemnity, imposing the condition that Germany shall have the right to send her commodities into Eussia duty free for fifteen years.

LENIN'S QUESTIONABLE METHODS.

Received 9.10.

PETROGRAD, Dec 9

Lenin has completed a scheme for undermining the Constituent Assembly by a system of continual re-elec-tion. A Commissioner of Elections for the Constituent Assembly has been appointed with practically autocratic powers.

RUSSIAN REPUDIATION. ENGLISH RESIDENTS BECOMING ANXIOUS. Received 9.10. LONDON, Dec 9. A special correspondent says Russia's repudiation of her public debt will mean a serious loss to the British Government, which has rendered much financial assistance to Russia since the beginning of the war, though little scrip is held by British investors, who never favoured Russian finance French investors are very heavily hit. Mr. Bourchier states it is daily becoming more evident the Bolsheviks are little dispersed to welcome a constituent Assembly wherein opposition parties are considerably represented, hence the B'olshevik decision to authorise the Sovets to control all elections, quashing retlrns at their discretion.

Other reports indicate that the British residents are growing more anxious, particularly hi Petrograd. The Consulate is crowded, but official protection counts for nothing. Reo" Guards and the populace control the situation.