MARTIAL LAW

Wairarapa Times-Age, 17 March 1943, Page 4

MARTIAL LAW

DECLARED IN HAUTE SAVOIE P 1 1 111 IN SUPPORT OF LABOUR CONSCRIPTION. NAZI ULTIMATUM TO LAVAL. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) (Received This Day, 11.40 a.m.) LONDON, March 16. Martial law has been proclaimed in Haute Savoie, in a new effort to quell French guerillas, says the Algiers radio. Vichy’s Guarde Mobiles are reported to be refusing to fight. An Associated Press correspondent bn the French frontier reports that motorised police, led by S.S. troopers, day and night are rolling along the roads into the hills of Haute Savoie in a hunt for guerillas, but so far have not made contact with them. Italians are guarding the northern frontiers, but are not participating in the conscription search. The Germans at present are starting to conscript doctors, chemists, dentists and veterinary surgeons throughout Haute Savoie, although the area is already short of adequate medical services. St Gingolph is a dead town, with every public establishment closed. Reuter’s Geneva correspondent says Sauckel, Germany’s manpower chief, sent an ultimatum to Laval last night that unless he fulfils his promises to send another quarter of a million workers to Germany within the next three days, the German Army will be called in to supervise the enrolment of workers throughout France, and will be instructed to act with absolute ruthlessness. 1 The “Gazette de Lausanne" says the French police are raiding afternoon performances at cinemas. Any young men unable to give plausible reasons for their presence are receiving marching orders for Germany within 24 hours. According to the Vichy radio, the Vichy Government has issued a new order for the mobilisation of all skilled workers in France, aged eighteen to thirty. Only skilled workers no longer working in industrial establishments are required at present to report to the local authorities. TELEGRAPHS & TELEPHONES ALL LINES CUT BY AXIS. (Received This Day, 12.50.p.m.) LONDON, March 16. There is no reliable news of the latest developments of the French guerilla campaign, because the Axis authorities have cut all telegraph and telephone communication between Savoy and Switzerland. “The Times” correspondent on the Ferrich frontier says resisters are flocking to Savoy from other parts of France. The guerillas total between 16,000 and 17.000 men.