AUSTRIAN SCANDAL

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 59, Issue 129, 14 March 1939, Page 8

AUSTRIAN SCANDAL

GERMAN ALLEGATIONS, THEFTS AT CHANCELLERY. VIENNA, March 2. The Kripo (criminal police) in Vienna report the discovery of scandalous embezzlemen stin tho former Austrian Chancellery. The German press makes use of the now discovery in attacking Drs Schuschnigg and Doll fuss, both formerly Austrian Chancellors. The Dollfuss Fund was intended for administrative expenses and for the Government Press Department. Some hundred thousand Austrian schillings wore taken from the fund every year and were secretly given to national newspaper companies, it is alleged. German police headquarters allege that considerable sums were distributed among foreign newspaper correspondents to make reports favourable to the Sehuschnigg Government. It is stated that 20,000 Austrian schillings were remitted every month to a bank in Brussels for the account of the Archduke Otto of Hapsburg, son of the last Austrian Emperor and archenemy of Herr Hitler. Two managers of big Austrian publishing firms and a former Cabinet Director have been arrested. “They belong to those numerous people who were corrupted by Herr Schier, administrator of the fund,” says a police statement. Scliier is accused of having spent considerable sums of the fund on his secretary, Miss Drzmiselc. The legal proceedings are expected to begin soon.’ They will be extended to make a political exhibition, in the manner of the Soviet trials. The Gennan News Agency claims that the law suit will disclose corruption of'morals among Jews, Catholics, and former Social Democrats of Vienna. The Archduke Otto is already outlawed in Germany and Austria for alleged “high treason.”