“No Deadline On Berlin By Russia ”

Press, Volume C, Issue 29535, 9 June 1961, Page 13

“No Deadline On Berlin By Russia ”

(N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) WASHINGTON, June 7. The Soviet Prime Minister (Mr Khrushchev) made no flat warning to President Kennedy that the Berlin situation must be settled by the end of this year, an authoritative United States source said yesterday, according to United Press International. This information was released after a day of rumours of new and dire Berlin warnings. It also followed repeated questions by reporters and consultations between the State Department and the White House, United Press International said.

The State Department press officer, Mr Lincoln White today publicly acknowledged for the first time that the Soviet Union had handed United States representatives two memoranda at the close of the KennedyKhrushchev talks in Vienna. One outlined the substance of Mr Khrushchev's statements to Mr Kennedy on Berlin. The other stated the Russian position on disarmament and nuclear testing An authorilative source said the Berlin memorandum did not say the Berlin situation must be settled by the end of the year. But Mr Khrushchev had made this statement in several recent speeches, U.P.I. said. The same source said Mr Khrushchev in his talks with Mr Kennedy had “indicated he would like to have an understanding on Berlin in a certain length of time, but imposed no cut-off date," the news agency reported. The source said the Soviet Prime Minister made clear as he had before, that he wanted to sign a separate peace treaty with East Germany, turning over access routes to West Berlin to the

East Germans. “But he put no time on it,” the source said. President Kennedy and Mr Khrushchev had warned each other during their Vienna talks that each would use force if necessary in the Berlin crisis, the “Washington Post” said today. The newspaper’s diplomatic correspondent. Murrey Marder, in a dispatch from London said: “This obviously was what President'Kennedy meant in his report to the nation on Tuesday night when he said ‘Our most sombre talks were on the subject of Germany and Berlin'.” The dispatch said Mr Khrushchev had told the President that the Soviet Union would sign its own peace treaty with East Germany if no-one else would join in a general peace treaty. “If the Allies tried to ignore this Soviet transfer to East Germany of control over the access routes to West Berlin, said Mr Khrushchev, the East Germans would use force to stop the West from going through—and the Soviet Union would support this use of force.”

Mr Marder said. "In other words, the Soviet Union would regard any Allied attempt to push past the East Germans as an act of belligerency. ACCESS RIGHTS “President Kennedy, in turn, gave Mr Khrushchev this warning: regardless of what the Soviet Union might sign with East Germany, the United States would hold the Soviet Union responsible for maintaining the West’s warwon access rights to West Berlin. “If there is any attempt to interfere witih Allied access to the pre-war German capital. the President continued, the West would use force to break through to the city, which is 110 miles inside East Germany. “Further, the West would consider any Communist attempt to interfere with its rights of access an act of belligerency. “The President stressed that the very existence of the United States as well as of Europe was involved with the Berlin issue, which America by no means considers an isolated question. Khrushchev said it could lead to war if any attempt was made to by-pass the East Germans in Allied transit to Berlin once a peace treaty was signed.” the dispatch said. The White House announced that initial public reaction to President Kennedy’s television and radio report on his European trip has been “overwhelmingly favourable.” His press secretary, Mr Pierre Salinger, said the general tone of hundreds of telegrams received so far had been of “appreciation tor the President’s candour." Mr Kennedy continued to get bipartisan Congressional congratulations. He headed off possible Republican Party criticism by taking the party's leaders into his confidence about the Vienna meetings, Reuter said.