STARVING RUSSIA.

Taranaki Daily News, 22 August 1921, Page 5

STARVING RUSSIA.

CHILDREN DESERTED. THE TOLL OF CHOLERA. HARVEST PROSPECTS. By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. Received August 21, 11.5 p.m. Copenhagen, August 19. Reval messages state that M. Lunacharsky (the Soviet Commissiary of Education) declares that crowds of children who have been deserted by their parents are living on the banks of the Volga, where many deaths are due to’ starvation. Some parents are drowning their children rather than witness their gradual starvation. Communists in districts untouched by the famine have begun their flight, fearing violence from the'Wandering starving masses. Received August 21, 11.5 p.m. London, August 20. The Russian trade delegation in London states the harvest in the provinces outside the famine area should be satisfactory. considering the difficulties and the old-fashioned methods of agriculture in vogue. The white Russian provinces can export to the famine area forty-eight thousand tons of potatoes and eight thousand tons of corn. The total number of cholera cases since January is 71,871. Loi lon, August 19. The Times’ Riga correspondent reports that the latest figures from Russia show that the harvest is twice as bad as the previous worst', also a smaller 'area is cultivated. In eight provinces it completely failed. Sixteen million inhabitants are affected. The deficit is over thirty-six million poods. The immediate needs on August 5 were a million poods, also seed. Ukraine and Siberia are the only possible sources of relief inside Russia. The Soviet at Volga offered a prize of a million and a half roubles for the best hunger bread containing a maximum of twelve per cent, of cereals, the remainder bark, edible wild plants, and other substitutes.—Times Service.