IN RUSSIAN HANDS.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 65, Issue 221, 29 June 1945, Page 4

IN RUSSIAN HANDS.

AUSTRALIAN PRISONER OF WAR. “NEGLECT AND ILL-TREATMENT” (Rec. 2.5 p.m.) SYDNEY, This Day. Hatred, suspicion, neglect and illtreatment by the Russians were the lot of Australians who escaped from German prison camps into Russia, said Gunner Vivian Cox, formerly of the Australian Imperial Force 3rd Tank Attack Regiment in an interview published by the “Sydney Morning Herald” to-day. Gunner Cox lias returned to Australia by way of Odessa after having spent four years as a prisoner/of war. He was two months in Russia after escaping from a prisoner of war camp, in Poland. Throughout that period he was confined, with others, ill filthy quarters under an armed guard. Hundreds of British, Americans, and Australians were eight days in overcrowded cattle trucks, travelling from Warsaw to Odessa. They were given no food and the armed guards said they would be shot if they left the trucks. “In the two months I was held by the Russians, I received no food but boiled barley and black bread,” said Gunner Cox. “The Russians refused to let any of us send messages, home to say we were free. Cablegrams we tried to send to the British Consul were torn up in front of us. Everywhere we met hatred and suspicion. Although most of the equipment the Russians used, and much of the food, they ate, came from tlie United States the Americans were treated no better. Gunner Cox said that conditions at the front in the Polish village where he had been hiding were “absolutely fantastic.” The Russian soldiers behaved like animals. They jvere usually drunk with vodka. They confiscated homes and property at random. They raped Polish women in the open streets. Polish home rule was “just a joke.” Nothing could be done without permission from the Russians. A Russian corporal had more real power than a Polish general. Poles accused of collaboration were shot by Russian soldiers on the mere word- of an informer.