CRUMBLING COALITION

Press, Volume XCIV, Issue 28162, 28 December 1956, Page 7

CRUMBLING COALITION

Resignation Refused (Rec. 11 p.m.) NEW YORK. December 27. The Sastroamidjojo Government had refused to bow to the demands that it resign, in spite of signs that its coalition support was breaking up, said the American Associated Press today. The Cabinet, made up of members of eight parties, announced its decision following an eighthour emergency meeting. Then the Indonesian Parliament’s steering committee was called to discuss the crisis in the country’s second largest island.

The Veterans’ Party, relatively small, announced its withdrawal from the Cabinet and there were signs that others would follow suit.

A spokesman for the Veterans said that the Roman Catholic and Protestant parties were prepared to get out, the report said. Sources in the Moslem Majumi Party—one of Indonesia’s “big three” —said that party executives meeting in Bandung had cabled its Cabinet Ministers to quit unless the Cabinet resigned and demanded that President Sukarno form a new regime.

Another big Moslem party, also of the big three, appeared ready to pull out. Its executive board today urged its withdrawal from the Government.

The Prime Minister presumably still had the backing of his own big party, the leftist Nationalist Party. Mr Sastroamidjojo has usually sided with Communist China and the Soviet Union in preference to those he calls ‘Western imperialists.”

Plane Search Suspended

(Rec 9 p.m.) VANCOUVER (British Columbia), December 26. The Royal Canadian Air Force today suspended its search for a missing Trans-Canadia Airlines aircraft and its 62 passengers and crew. A Royal Canadian Air Force spokesman said that because of weather and snow conditions the wreckage would probably not be found until the spring. The North Star aircraft was last heard from 17 days ago on a flight to eastern Canada.

36 Killed By Cloudburst

(Rec. 8 p.m.) PASSA QUATRO (Brazil), December 26. The death toll from a Christmas Day cloudburst in the small Minas Gerais province town. Passa Quatro. stood at 36 today, with nearly 100 injured seriously The rains began on Monday and continued until runoff streams overflowed and the town was inundated. Many of. the *O.OOO residents were forced to abandon their homes and those who failed to flee promptly were trapped.