REACTIONS TO AGREEMENT

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25797, 7 May 1949, Page 7

REACTIONS TO AGREEMENT

in Paris, the decision to lift the Berlin blockade was welcomed by the French Government, but at the same time no responsible official or Cabinet Minister was confident that "the Russians were prepared to abandon their ideological warfare and diplomatic pressure against the West. A genuine political understanding with Russia is regarded as cut of the question in French diplomatic circles. Nevertheless French officials believe that under the economic pressure placed on their zone by the Western counter-blockade the Russians have made up their minds to reach some new working agreement which will lessen the existing tension. A Dutch Foreign Office spokesman in The Hague described the end of the blockade as the “first fruits of the determined attitude maintained by the Western European Powers and the United States throughout the conflict.” He added that the lifting of the blockade would grbatly facilitate trade between the Netherlands and the Soviet zone of Germany. The Russian people learned yesterday of the progress made by the Big Four Powers on Berlin when all their newspapers published a Tass message from New York. This said: “Representatives of the Four Powers discussed all problems of the situation in Berlin. Agreement was attained on all the important questions of principle.

“Certain details are still being considered, but it is possible to say definitely that agreement was attained on the mutual cancellation of all restrictions which had been introduced in Germany, and which were the theme of. these talks. “Upon the lapse of a certain time there will :ake place a meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers, which will review questions concerning Germany and the problems arising out of the situation created in Berlin, and also the question of Berlin’s currency. The Big Four representatives hope that the remaining questions connected with the details can be settled in a very short period of time.”. The Berlin correspondent of the United Press says that sources close to the Soviet headquarters said that Russia’s first step after lifting the blockade would be to demand a plebiscite 10 force the establishment of a central German government. Observers said that virtually every German would vote for a united Germany. By this means Russia hoped, first, to block the formation of a Western German State in the American, British, and French zones; second, to establish a central German Government and spread Communist and Soviet influence beyond the confines of the Soviet zone: third, to block the participation of Western Germany in the Atlantic Pact and the Western Union, and, fourth, to gain a voice in the control and management of the Ruhr.