POSSIBLE DRUG?

Taranaki Central Press, Volume IV, Issue 344, 27 January 1937, Page 5

POSSIBLE DRUG?

MOSCOW PRISONERS Strange Attitude Suggests Some' Outside Control. Press Association—Copyright. London, January 26. The attitude taken up by the Mos cow prisoners towards the charges is causing considerable speculation. The Morning Post says one suggestion fs that they are under the influence of some drug affecting their will power.

The Times says the most perplexing feature of the whole affair is the behaviour of the prisoners. At previous Soviet trials they have been openly defiant like the British engineers in, 1933, or broken and cowed like the Zinovieff and Kamaneff group in August, but Radek and his companions give blithe assurances of their guilt. A London psychiarist interviewed by the Morning Post revealed that a drug existed which would fully account for the prisoners’ behaviour. It was not in the public interest to identify it but the effect was to render the subject "incapable of resistance.” Moreover, it was not inconsistent with its effects that the subject should remain cheerful.