ADMINISTRATION OF GERMANY

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25091, 24 January 1947, Page 7

ADMINISTRATION OF GERMANY

SHARPER CRITICISM OF BRITISH RESOLUTIONS PASSED BY COUNCILS (Specia. l Correspondent NZJ’.A.) (Rec. 8 p.m.) LONDON, Jan. 23. Reports reaching London from Germany say that German criticism of the British administration is growing sharper. In Hamburg, the City Council passed a resolution declaring that the coal crisis was not only a result of the war but “revealed grave faults and negligence in the policy of the occupying Power.” There have been hundreds of similar protests during the last fortnight. A special correspondent of the “Glasgow Herald” and “Manchester Guardian” says German public morale is being poisoned by self-pity—the product of hardship in the present and pessimism about the future. A resolution carried by the Cologne City Council declared: “Morale is collasping and all confidence in democracy and in the occupying Powers threatens to disappear.” The Solingen (near Dusseldorf) City Council said in a public statement that the German population regarded its present deprivations as a reprisal. Correspondents point out that most of these and similar resolutions appear to be designed for home consumption and intended as far as possible to exonerate the German leaders and throw the blame for the present state of the country upon the occupying Power. There is no doubt that the cumbrous occupation machine and the stranglehold of the diversity of controls have helped to throw Germany into her present mess, but most German leaders also know, though they will not admit it, that before any real recovery can be expected the German people must themselves make an effort.