LOW COUNTRIES STILL UNEASY

Press, Volume LXXVI, Issue 22922, 19 January 1940, Page 9

LOW COUNTRIES STILL UNEASY

German. Activities On Dutch Frontier

FLOOD DEFENCES IN NORTHERN FRANCE , (UNITED PRESS ASSOCIATION—COPYRIGHT.) . (Received January 18, 11.30 p.m.) LONDON, January 18. Although the tension in the Low Countries has eased, the Netherlands authorities have announced the extension of the state of siege to the waters of south Holland and to the waters near Kallantsoog, near the naval base at Helder, which has been blacked out to deprive foreign aeroplanes of a beacon. Belgium has made it plain that her precautions will not, be relaxed.

The French have completed flood defences on their northern frontier, and as a result a great artificial lake can be created, making virtually impossible the passage of mechanised and other troops. Machinery has been installed, enabling the French to inundate the broad lowlands between France and Belgium, thus creating a third water barrier against Germany, with Holland’s dykes and Belgium’s Albert Canal.

An Amsterdam message says that German troops have begun erecting electrified barbed-wire along the entire frontier between Germany and the Netherlands. It is reported that this is to prevent snies and saboteurs (entering Germany, and to prevent the leakage of information about troop movements in the Siegfried Line extensions. Only a few roads have been left open. The wiring cuts through frontier woods and private properties.

The British troops on the Western Front are jubilant over the renewal of limited home leave. Trains carrying soldiers to England started from various railheads last night. The tension is easier, although watchfulness is not being relaxed. The weather is very severe. Thick storm clouds rolled up, clinging low, like mist, to the snow-covered ground. Limited leave has been granted to the Royal Air Force in France.