FEARS IN ITALY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 24 November 1942, Page 4

FEARS IN ITALY

FUGITIVES JAM ROADS FLIGHT FROM BOMBED CITIES BADOGLIO HEADS PEACE MOVE. MUSSOLINI SEEKING HELP. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) (Received This Day, 11.10 a.m.) LONDON, November 23. Marshal Badoglio recently headed a movement for a separate peace with the Allies, according to travellers reaching Ankara from Italy. Marshal Badoglio, as head of a group of anti-Fascists, is reported, with the full knowledge of King Victor Emmanuel, the Crown Prince and Count Ciano (Foreign Minister), to have approached the Vatican to mediate. Mussolini, on hearing about the movement violently quarrelled with Count Ciano. These events are believed to have been the background of the recent attacks against the Vatican by the party newspaper “Regima Fascista.” A Zurich message says it is reliably reported from Rome that Mussolini is attempting to strengthen the Government in the event of a total Allied occupation of North Africa. He made contact with the National Party Leader Signor Fedezoni and an ex-Liberal Minister, Signor Orlando and also with some Catholics and ex-leaders of the Socialist and Syndicalist movement, with a view to forming a National Defence Government. Admitting the Italian Army’s inability to protect the northern provinces from British air raids, the Italian Propaganda Minister, Signor Pavolini, in a broadcast, suggested that the inhabitants of Genoa, Milan and Turin should evacuate their homes and seek an asylum elsewhere, reports the “New York Times” Berne correspondent. The Fascist Party is evacuating thousands of children, while hotels and vacation resorts have reopened to receive evacuees, adds the correspondent. Refugees are reported to be pouring southwards jamming the roads. Travellers arriving in Berne declared that threequarters of the population of Genoa had already fled the city.