England and Russia.

Te Aroha News, Volume II, Issue 95, 28 March 1885, Page 6

England and Russia.

The jubilations of the Russian press over the agreement entered into with the British Government, providing that neither shall advance) can have only one meaning. They accept this arrangement as virtually conceding the status quo as the basis of further negotiations. It means that Russia has no intention of retiring, and believes that the British Government will allow the Czar to hold permanently the Afghan territory that has already been invaded. A sequel to this ill-timed jubilation and professions of a wieh for peace reaches us this afternoon in the ionn of an intimation that Alikhanoff, a Russian secret agent, is endeavouring to foment an outbreak among the natives of Panjdeh. Colonel Alikhanoff is the Governor of Merv, and probably the message should read that he has sent secret agents into Panjdeh, with the object of creating a disturbance, which will furnish Russia with a pretext for interfering. It will be remembered that the Russians made it a condition of their remaining stationary that the natives Bhould continue quiet j true to their old tactics, while making an agreement professedly in good faith, they left a loophole of escape wideenoughtoenablethem to break through whenever the time should be deemed convenient. That intrigue has so soon begun looks as though the Czar had made up his mind to fight now, and the intelligence which closes the message, that the British fleet is all ready to sail for the Black Sea, looks as though the English Government have no faith in the honesty or pacific intentions of the Czar, and are prepared for action.