MOST CRITICAL DAYS SINCE WAR

Wairarapa Times-Age, 27 August 1938, Page 6

MOST CRITICAL DAYS SINCE WAR

Sinister Motives Behind Sudeten Tactics OBVIOUSLY PROVOCATIVE PROCLAMATION By Telegraph.—Press Association. —Copyright. (Recd This Day, 12.30 p.m.) LONDON, August 26. The Australian Associated Press says the events of the last twenty-four hours make it unmistakeable that Europe is facing the most critical days since the war. An opinion is growing that more sinister motives are behind the Sudetens’ continual delaying tactics than appear on the surface. Britain realises that Dr Hodza’s negotiations are fast developing into a race against time. It is feared in official circles that every effort must be made to hasten a solution of the problem before the Nazi Congress at Nuremberg, early in September, even if it means patching up the situation in order to remove the slightest cause for outside interference. The gravity of the situation is'increased by the issue to members of the Henlein Party of a proclamation described by the “Daily Telegraph’s” Prague correspondent as “dangerous and defiant and issued for no other purpose than to provoke a conflict.”. The proclamation states that the party no longer assumes responsibility for the freedom and property of members. Consequently they are free to exercise the right of self-defence where attacked. The document claims that incidents have hitherto been passed over with confidence that the Government would end Marxist and irresponsible Czech terrorism, but that this is no longer possible. “The Times” Berlin correspondent describes this as the most sinister report from Prague for some time, declaring that precisely such a development has been feared by foreign observers. The situation is now so delicate that any serious incident in Czechoslovakia might have the grtivest consequences. The correspondent adds that it is reiterated in Berlin that British public opinion would not ' support more than peaceful intervention in Czechoslovakia. It is on this that many people in Germany base their outlook.