A WORLD WAR

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 60, Issue 134, 18 March 1940, Page 5

A WORLD WAR

SOVIET FEARS OUTBREAK. DEFENCES TO BE BUILT. ALONG NEW FINNISH FRONTIER. {United Press Association.—Copyright.) (Received This Day, 12.5 p.m.) HELSINKI, March 17. According to a report from Moscow, the Soviet, fearing a general outbreak of war, proposes to build as quickly as possible, a Voroshilov Lino of defences along the new Russian-Finnish frontier. NOT AFRAID OF ALLIES. BOAST AT KREMLIN TALKS. (Received This Day, 11.10 a.m.) . HELSINKI, (March 17. M. Paasikivi received the Press. Ho sai"d the Kremlin talks were more formal and colder than those of last autumn. Five meetings were held, in which the Russians yielded only a few unimportant points, but nothing on the points which the Finns desired. M. Molotov, when the question of Allied help cropped up, said, “We are not afraid of Britain or France.” IN FAR EAST, RUSSO-JAPANESE CLASH TOKIO, March 15. In a clash between Japanese and Soviet patrols near the Sakhalin-Krtra-futo border, the Japanese are reported to have suffered two casualties and the Russians 12. The Japanese claim that the Soviet troops fired without warning. The Tokio correspondent of the Associated Press of America states that the Japanese Government has sent a written protest to the Soviet Embassy asserting that -tho Russians illegally attacked a Japanese patrol. The Peiping correspondent of the Associated Press of America says that there are indications that both Russia and Japan are reinforcing their positions in tllo Nomonhan hill section of tho Manchukuo-Mongoliaii frontier in preparation for their “annual war.”