VISIT TO RUSSIA.

Press, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20625, 15 August 1932, Page 5

VISIT TO RUSSIA.

"CURE FOR COMMUNISTS."

A Letter received from .Mr A. U. Mills, a Melbourne solicitor, who has returned to London after a 3000-mile tour in Russia, indicates that conditions in that country are deplorable. "I had more than hoped that unfavourable reports of Russia were untrue," Mr Mills stated. "Unfortunately, <t is difficult to write anything of praise. I saw tens of thousands on the verge of starvation. Long queues stand for hours in the streets waiting for an issue of bread. Bread and coloured water, called tea, is almost all these poor Russians have to sustain them. They look it, too. Their clothing is largely rags, and in all cases of the poorest'quality. It is not uncommon to see these long queues waiting until midnight for bread. Milk is scarcely obtainable, and only a reckless person would drink it. "In Leningrad, with a population of more talin 2,00p.0C0, the shops are not Letter, and seldom as good as a shop for pioneers in the back country of Australia. If I were to tell you about the bad conditions of the streets, tramcars, sewerage, or housing conditions, you would think 1 might bo exaggerating the bad state of affairs. I met there several Australian Com- | munists and also some English and American Communists. They, with one exception, an Englishman, whoso bona fides I suspected, were simply not Communists any more." T am endeavouring to get one misguided Australian home from there. Russia will cure any Communist if he goes to work there.''