FRENCH COMMUNISTS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXVI, Issue 118, 21 May 1945, Page 5

FRENCH COMMUNISTS

Party's Bid For Participation In Provisional Government CONSTITUTIONAL METHODS Rec. 11.30 a.m. LONDON, May 20. Following up the recent municipal election gains, the Communist party is making a strong bid for greater participation in the French Provisional Government, says Reuters Paris correspondent. The Communist paper Humanite to-day publishes a six-point party programme described as a policy "of reconstruction and national unity under the banner of democracy and progress." The programme demands a citizen army capable of carrying out obligations regarding the occupation of Germany: the maintenance of collective security: a foreign policy based on union with Britain, the United States and Russia. The programme demands an election before December in order to reestablish Republican legality and provide France with a new constitution, and declares: "The French Communist party is ready to take larger responsibility in the direction of public affairs within the Provisional Government of the French Republic, presided over by General de Gaulle and reorganised in the image of the nation." Political quarters, says Reuters correspondent, regard the declaration as the most significant indication so far given that the French Communist party desires to follow constitutional methods and take its place as one of the leading governmental parties.