SIGNS OF UNREST

Taranaki Daily News, 21 September 1940, Page 7

SIGNS OF UNREST

By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright.

FRENCH ABROAD WAVER

Received 10.50 p.m. London, September 19. ]\JORE news of unrest comes from the strongholds of France's Syrian army, says the correspondent of the Times at Cairo. Many instances of French resistance are setting a delicate and dangerous problem for Italian agents who are endeavouring to rot the French army from within. The Italians fear resistance, besides sabotage. The attitude of the French soldier can be summed up thus: "We have the guns. What are you going to do about it? While the Syrians say France is only mandatory here, she has no right to hand us over to Italy."

Italian agents at three divisional heSdquarters have been instructed to make an inventory of French army equipment. Although this is an obvious prelude to the dismantling and seizure of guns, tanks, -ammunition lorries and planes, two senior French delegates to the armistice commission have consented, but junior officers and men are resisting. French regulars at the chief training base are taking rifles to their tents at night time. Strangers have been ordered from the camp. Similar happenings have occurred at a base where Italians are trying to secure modern Glenn Martin bombers. The crews of two French submarines at Beirut are stubbornly staying aboard, grimly awaiting the moment when they will be asked to come off. Syrian soldiers at a camp of the Camel Corps near Damascus are refusing to give up their camels and ammunition. They are reported to have buried the ammunition in the mountains. Tension in Morocco. Reports reaching Madrid from Morocco indicate tense expectancy through French North Africa. where a decision ,to accept an offer of British protection is expected daily. General Verget, newly appointed French resident-general in North Africa, is having great difficulty in handling the situation, says the coi-respondent of the Daily Express at Madrid. There have been wholesale arrests of army officers and civil servants, which apparently have been carried out reluctantly in face of popular opposition and widespread sympathy for General de Gaulle. The spread of General de Gaulle's Free France movement must be the reason why Marshal Petain has sent General Weygand to French North Africa, says the Daily Telegraph's former Paris correspondent. Marshal Petain, he points out, has already acquiesced in the death sentence* passed on General de Gaulle. His motives, therefore, seem clear, namely, to rally what remains of the Vichy factions in Africa to re-acceptance 0 i the defeat of France. Ignoble Task. It is difficult, however, he says, to see such a great soldier as General Weygand, especially after such a great time has passed, throwing himself wholeheartedly into his ignoble task. He is an old friend and collaborator of General I>gues, commander-in-chief in Africa, whose sentiments regarding the Vichy Government's capitulation are the subject of spaculation. The situation at Dakar (Senegal) is still being evolved and, probably, favourably to General de Gaulle. There are now no Germans in a position to exercise influence over the local French administration, which is jealous of its own authority. "The fact that the Germans compelled Marshal Petain to dismiss the Colonial Secretary (Senator Lemery) because he is coloured will not be overlooked by Ihe Senegalese and other tribes. Other changes in the Petain Cabinet indicate a desire to effect economies while removing the principal Ministers whom the Germans least like."