GENERAL STRIKE IN ROME

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25366, 13 December 1947, Page 7

GENERAL STRIKE IN ROME

ONLY MINOR ACTS OF VIOLENCE

CLOSE WATCH KEPT BY ARMED POLICE

(Rec. 9.30 pun.) LONDON, Dec. 12. Only minor acts of violence, with an unspecified number of arrests, marked the first day of the general strike in the city and province of Rome. “The Government had left nothing to chance,.” says the Rome correspondent of “The Times,” “and strong forces of armed police were in evidence everywhere, especially outside political party headquarters and important Government buildings, and armoured cars patrolled the main streets.

“Food shops and markets were opened for a few hours, but there was no public transport, and all cafes, cinemas, and theatres were closed, though essential public services were still working. “No newspapers appeared, but the Christian Democrat organ was preparing to publish this morning. “Most of the civil servants reported for duty.” “The Left Wing organisers of the strike had evidently long prepared for it,” says the Rome correspondent of the “Daily Telegraph.” “They put on the streets a considerable body of men wearing brassards marked ‘civil police.’ These men acted as pickets. The police arrested about 100 of them, and nearly 100 other strikers for obstruction. “One clash occurred outside Parliament Buildings during a session of the Constituent Assembly. Communist deputies emerged on the steps singing the ‘lnternationale.’ Police drove jeeps into the crowd and dispersed it”