TENSION IN SHANGHAI

Press, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23080, 24 July 1940, Page 9

TENSION IN SHANGHAI

AMERICAN DEFENCES

REINFORCED

BODYGUARDS ASSIGNED

TO NATIONALS

(Received July 23, 7 p.m.)

SHANGHAI, July 22,

United States marine patrols have reinforced the American defence sector in Shanghai, and in addition bodyguards have been assigned to Americans who have been threatened because they are considered anti-Japan-ese.

Americans in Shanghai have agreed to send a message to Mr Roosevelt urging him to inform Japan that she will be held responsible for the safely of Americans in China on the ground that Japan controls the Chinese authorities in the occupied territory. They also suggest retaliation against Japanese journalists in' the United States in the event of mistreatment of Americans in Shanghai. The situation was intensified when a Japanese Embassy official Said that many people in Shanghai were living in a land of fairy tales because they failed to realise that the Japanese forces and the Nanking Government exercised the real power. ' Lack of realisation of this actual situation gave rise to various acts of terrorism, and unless the cause were removed the terrorism would remain.

NEW CABINET IN

JAPAN

(Received July 23, 7 p.m.)

TOKYO, July 22.

Prince Konoye’s new Cabinet was installed at ceremonies at the Palace. Prince Konoye convened the Cabinet and later announced that the Government was determined to proceed with the enhancement of the spirit on which the Japanese Empire was founded. Mr Chokuyo Murase, a former ViceMinister for Commerce and Industry, has been appointed chief of the Cabinet’s legislation bureau.

GOVERNMENT POST

FOR MR SOONG

REPORT BY HONG KONG

NEWSPAPER

HONG’KONG, July 22. The “Hong Kong Telegraph” quotes a responsible source as saying that Mr T V. Soong, who is at present in the United States, will become head of the Chungking Ministry of Economic Warfare, and that his visit to Washington is connected with this. . [Mr Soong is known in China as the great reformer of modern government finance. He modernised and consolidated the various departments of taxation and for the first time m modern Chinese history he succeeded in balancing the Government budget in 1933, without recourse to loans.]

MUNITIONS FROM

CANADA

EXPENDITURE ON NEW

PLANTS

(Received July 23, 10 p.m.)

OTTAWA, July 22.

The Minister for Supply (Mr C. D. Howe) announced that Canada was constructing 12 new munitions plants at a cost of 19,000,000 dollars, making the capital expenditure commitments in the last 10 days 30,000,000 dollars. Complete plant expansions under way in Canada, financed wholly or partly by the Canadian and British Governments, Involve an expenditure of 80,000,000 dollars.