APOLOGY BY ENEMY

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27112, 7 August 1953, Page 9

APOLOGY BY ENEMY

Behaviour Of Prisoners

(Rec. 8 p.m,) SEOUL, August 6. Communist liaison officers at the prisoner exchange point at Panmunjon today apologised to United Nations officers for the unruly behaviour of Communist prisoners-of-war returning from the Allied lines.

The North Koreans and the Chinese behaved well until they reached the reception area, and then they began screaming and yelling insults, and throwing off the clothing issued by the Allies.

An American major was hit under the eye with a crutch yesterday, and was struck in the mouth this morning by a combat boot hurled by one Communist prisoner. Another Communist punched an American ambulance driver.

The Communists promised at a formal meeting called by the Allies that such incidents would not happen again The Communists began to deliver Allied prisoners 12 minutes before the schedule today.

The prisoners today did not look nearly so fit and smart as the first batch who arrived yestqrday. Most of them were dressed in old uniforms compared with the smart new rig-outs worn by the men returning yesterday. Many Koreans who came back were wan and haggard, some of them so thin that they looked like Belsen victims. One of them brought in on a litter was found to be dead on arrival.

Enemy Agency’s Claim The Communist New China News Agency alleged today, in a dispatch from Kaesong, that returned Communist prisoners were emaciated and wan and bore marks that reflected torture in prisoner-of-war “hell camps” in South Korea. This agency said the men were in rags, barefooted, or with only one shoe. They wore worn-out American issue uniforms on which were painted “P.W.,” or “P.0.W..” The agency said they contrasted sharply with United Nations repatriates stepping smiling from Communist ambulances, each with a small parcel of personal belongings.