ARREST OF DR. HACHA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 20 November 1939, Page 5

ARREST OF DR. HACHA

STILL REPORTED IN SPITE OF DENIALS REFUSAL TO SIGN DECREE OF MOBILISATION. APPEAL FOR PRESERVATION OF ORDER. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright LONDON. November 19. Despite German denials that the President of the Czech Protectorate, Dr Hacha, has been arrested, reports persist from reliable sources that the Gestapo has confined him to his castle near Prague, The confinement is stated to have partly resulted from his refusal to visit Berlin in order to sign a decree mobil-. ising a million Czechs for attachment to German regiments in the proportion of one Czech to three Germans. The Berlin correspondent of the British United Press says the Propaganda Ministry states that Dr Hacha made a broadcast appealing to the Czechs t» preserve order and stating that they should realise that the protectorate is now incorporated in the “vital space” of the greater Reich, and its Government, which represents the best interests of the people, should be implicitly trusted. The Prague correspondent of the Associated Press quotes Dr Hacha as saying: "You must not forget that Germany is in a strenuous war on the Western Front, for the prosecution of which the German people are entitled to take all they need. The Czech people have not been led into the war as in the Great War and they are in a better position than many neutrals.”