BELGIUM.

Taranaki Daily News, 10 September 1917, Page 5

BELGIUM.

UNDER THE GERMAN HEEL WORSE THAN SLAVERY. New York, Sept. ". The Belgian Government has given the Paris correspondent of the New YorkTimes a statement dese-ibing the suffering? of the Belgian people and impressed workers in "liungerland," behind t!ie Flanders front. "The press garig system begun in October, 1916. has been continued without intermission. Men of 17 to 45 years are seized haphazard irrespective of health or social position, and employed on ir ; rtary work and the construction of railroads. . They are treated brutally and beaten unmercifully. Complaints ■>f illness and exhaustion, are unheeded, r.:id they are not even permitted to receive packages of food from their families. 'Six hundred m?n wtre taken froti Harlbeke, of whom 22 are now dead and 108 reported incapacitated. When the iubjl-itants refused to serve they were forced —.to service by cruel gangs. '•The depsrturc of the Americans from T.elghsm has removed the last scruples of the invaders. The cost of living has quadrupled. -Butter w IS franc? per lb., an 1 pcthtoe.'. w'.ieh are the staple diet, i'.vi- Entirely iin-king. The Germans ars forcing Courtrai residents to distribute food and practitd'i.7 the most dastardly form of blackmail."