SWEDEN CANCELS AGREEMENT

Press, Volume LXXIX, Issue 24020, 7 August 1943, Page 5

SWEDEN CANCELS AGREEMENT

GERMAN TRAFFIC TO NORWAY TRANSIT OF UNARMED SOLDIERS (N.Z, Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, Aug. 5. It is officially announced that the Swedish Government has cancelled the transit traffic agreement with Germany permitting unarmed German soldiers to pass through Sweden to and from Norway. The announcement is the first blow against the Axis by a European neutral, states Reuter’s military correspondent. It is estimated that between 12,000 and 15,000 Germans were carried across Sweden weekly under the agreement, which has been in operation since June. 1940. The Stockholm correspondent of the “Daily Telegraph” states that with nearly 500,000 troops guarding her frontiers, Sweden was determined to remove what has long been the main

stumbling block to an improvement in relations with the United Nations—the German transit traffic. The decision to cancel the agreement was based on the claim that a state of war or near war exists de facto in Norway to-day. This contention is based on the large-scale British commando raids, the heavy bombings of Trondheim, the presence of uniformed Allied guerrillas in Norway, and the activities of the Norwegian underground patriot army. The original concession was granted to Germany in 1940 because a state of war had ceased to exist in Norway. Experts admit that one-third of the shipping tonnage now operating between Norway and Germany, carrying munitions and supplies, will have to be diverted to the transport of troops who formerly were carried across Sweden. This will expose the German troops to constant attack in waters policed by British submarines and the Royal Air Force. The transit of soldiers will cease on August 20, and no supplies will be carried after August 15. The cancellation is welcomed by the Norwegian Government in London, which states that it removes one of the main obstacles to understanding between Norway and Sweden. Sweden, s 2 ld ,j the Norwegian Government, should remember that Norway’s fight for freedom was a fight for the whole of Scandinavia. The British Government also welcomes the decision. A Government spokesman said that the agreement had always been regarded as a breach of Sweden’s neutrality.