FAST DETERIORATING

Wairarapa Times-Age, 17 September 1942, Page 4

FAST DETERIORATING

RELATIONS BETWEEN VICHY & UNITED STATES OPEN BREAK LIKELY REJECTION OF PAPAL PROTEST ON BEHALF OF JEWS. HELPLESSNESS ADMITTED BY PETAIN.

(By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) (Received This Day, 12.15 p.m.) NEW YORK, September 16. The protest of the Secretary of State (Mr Cordell Hull) to Vichy indicated clearly that relations between the United States and the Laval Government are fast deteriorating. says the “Herald-Tri-bune.” It is evident that America’s attitude has stiffened greatly within the past week. Diplomatic ob-

servers believe that if the tension continues to increase, an open

diplomatic break is not far off. The “Chicago Daily News,” in a foreign service despatch from Europe, says that when the Papal Nuncio protested to Marshal Petain, he intimated that the souls of French leaders would be imperilled should the persecution of Jews continue. Marshal Petain was deeply grieved, but expressed his inability to act. He referred the Papal envoy to Laval. The interview with Laval was stormy, the Nuncio being bluntly told to mind his own business.

Subsequently relations between Vichy and the Vatican reached their lowest point since the armistice in 1940. The seriousness of the situation is clear when it is remembered that Marshal Petain’s “national revolution” was based on religious grounds, and that the French clergy have enjoyed under Vichy a stronger position than since the French Revolution. Vichy, to please the Nazis, runs the risk of alienating the very elements on whom Petain relied to rebuild France.