RUSSIA AND TURKEY

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 24820, 9 March 1946, Page 7

RUSSIA AND TURKEY

Official Demand Reported

KARS- ARD AHAN TERRITORY (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) (I te- ? m > NEW YORK, Mar. 8. lhe Washington correspondent of “? ew York Times” has learned that the Soviet has officially asked Turkey to hand over the Kars and Ardahan region of eastern Turkey, and has informed the British and American Governments of its desire that the area be “returned" to Russia. The correspondent says that Mr Molotov requested the territory in a conversation with the Turkish Ambassador (Selim Serper) in Moscow last June. Officials in Washington said the demand had contributed considerably to the sepise of urgency Which had surrounded British-Russian relations since the Potsdam conference, where Mr Molotov informed the British and Americans of the demand. However, the Russian official claim is evidently more modest than those made by some writers in the Russian press, says the correspondent. They asked that Turkey cede the districts of Giresun. Gumasane. Erzerum, and Trebizond—an area estimated at 24,830 square miles with a population of 1.400.000, compared with 6600 square miles and -300.000 people in Kars and Aardahan.

[ln a statement early in January the Turkish Prime Minister (Sukru Saracoglu) denied that Russia had any right to the Turkish border provinces of Kars and Ardahan. They were ceded to Tsarist Russia in 1878 after the Russian-Turkish war. After the Great War a plebiscite agreed on between Turkey and Russia gave the provinces to Turkey by 85.000 votes to 1900.]