The Balkan Trouble

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 209, 23 January 1913, Page 5

The Balkan Trouble

OFFICERS' LEAVE CANCELLED. Cable —Press Association —Copyrigkt. Belgrade. January 21. All officers on leave have been ordered to return to their stations forthwith. . FINANCIAL STRAITS OF TURK i-V. Constantinople, January *2l. The empty Treasury is likely to influence the decision of to-morrow's meeting of the Grand Council in the direction of peace. THE BALKAN MASSACRES. CONSULAR REPORTS. Received 22, 10.5 p.m. London, January 22. Sir E. Grey, replying to Mr. W. Guinness, declined to publish the Consular reports concerning the massacres in the Balkans while the war was in progress. It was, he said, difficult for the Consuls to have accurate knowledge of reports which seemed to be well founded. RUSSIA'S ATTITUDE. AN OMINOUS POSITION. Received 23, 12.40 a.m. Constantinople, January 22. The newspaper Ikdam siites that Russia has strongly urged the cession of Adrianople. Otherwise Turkey's political and military situation will enter on a particularly embarrassing phase. Another version is that Russia's attitude in threatening the Ambassador refers tc the possibility of trouble in Asia Minor. The Ottoman Ambassadors have been ordered to sound the Powers with a view to placing Adrianople under Tnreo-Bulgarian administration. St. Petersburg, January 22.

It is stated in diplomatic circles that the Ambassador informed Kiamil that Russia would in nowise tacitly witness a resumption of hostilities.

GUNS FOR ROUMAXLL \ Received 23, 12.40 a.m., Vienna, January 22. Six truck-loads of French mountain gens have reached Roumania. AT DURAZZO. The Servian advance guard Teached the port of Durazzo, in search of the "little gateway on the Adriatic," late in November, and moved quietly down to the water's edge. The officer in command, a tall, hard-featured man, had with him some sixty-mounted men, haggard, unkempt and exhausted. Their uniforms were tattered and their sword blades tarnished, and they sat their tired horses stolidly while the officer received the submission of the town. Several leading Mussulmans and the Orthodox Bishop made short speeches and the officer gravely saluted each one with his sword. Then he spoke himself, in tones evidently intended to reach his own men as well as the gathered townspeople. He was pleased, he said, to received Durazzo's pacific assurance* and to be able to announce to the populace that the Servians would bring peace, order, security and good government. The war had been undertaken to deliver the Christian populations, but Mussulmans would share the blessing of the new order. Finally, turning to his own troopers, the officer reminded them that Dnrazzo, where centuries earlier their ancestors had fought, was the goa] towards which so many thousands of bayonets had set out. Now that it had been reached the great enterprise was at an end. Some hours later three battalions of infantry marched into the town smartly to the sound of trumpets, and the Albanian flag which was flying over the public buildings was pulled down. '"Throughout the following day," adds a correspondent of the London ■Daily Telegraph, "a constant stream of soldiery poured into the town, including many stragglers and a considerable quantity of baggage on pack ponies. Still the inhabitants were outwardly content. The Servian flag was displayed prominer f lv everywhere, and the shops were doing a roaring trade with the troops." The soldiers who had achieved so much were bitterly disappointed when they learned a few weeks later that their country was not to be allowed to hold the outlet to the «ea which thev had won.