TRIAL SCENE

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 57, 8 March 1944, Page 5

TRIAL SCENE

GENERAL'S EMOTION Giraud's Evidence In Algiers Treason Charge X.Z. Press Association —Copyright Rec. 10.30 a.m. LONDON, Mar. 7. A. dramatic scene marked the resumption of the trial at Algiers of Pueheau. Vichy Minister of the Interior, charged with treason. General Giraud, speaking with great emotion, bitterly denounced France s gauleiters. . Reuters correspondent says the tribunal was frozen into silence as Giraud declared: "When we get back to France it will be to rebuild France There will be no need for trials because traitors will be rapidly liquidated. People speak of the gauleiters of Poland and Czechoslovakia; they can speak of the gauleiters of France.

"There are in France to-day men who are servants of the Germans. They are making total war against women and children. I speak under the stress of emotion which you can understand. (This was a reference to the recent death of his daughter in Germany.) Men who are carrying out German orders to deport the wives of Communists and the daughters of generals, and who keep in Germany orphans aged nine or ten, are cowards."

Giraud said that he knew nothing about Pucheu's part in France between 1940-42 when he himself was a prisoner. Pucheu sent him a letter in the beginning of 1943 asking whether he could go to Africa and serve in the Army. Giraud said that, knowing nothing of the part Pucheu had played, he considered he had no right to forbid him and so advised him come over under an assumed name.

"I was astonished to learn of incidents on Pucheu's arrival at Casablanca when the battle of Tunisia was at its height and in the balance," said General Giraud. "I could not tolerate disorders. Moreover, I had received information from France on Vichy's policy between 1940-42 including the execution of hostages.. I decided to avoid trouble and place Pucheu under preventive detention. "I know now that the men o£ Vichy who, on November 10, 1942, did not order the French Army to resist the German.Army dishonoured themselves."