PACIFIC TESTS

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30215, 21 August 1963, Page 6

PACIFIC TESTS

Building Begins (N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) LONDON, August 19. The vanguard of a force of 300 French Foreign Legionnaires who are to help build a nuclear testing site in French Polynesia has arrived in Tahiti, the British United Press reported. The initial team of 70 officers and men consists of building specialists. The bulk of the men are Germans with a few Poles, Italians and Spaniards. The officers are French. Some of the legionnaires have been assigned to work ait Mururoa Atoll, a spit of coral jutting out of the Pacific Ocean 775 miles south-east of Tahiti. This is the possible site where France will detonate her first hydrogen bomb, some time in 1966. The remainder of the force will be put to work on the main depot at Arue, three miles from Papeete. The Territorial Assembly in Tahiti at first protested against the arrival of the legionnaires, but the original opposition has abated. Construction of the proving ground ia going ahead in spite of the Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty, which President de Gaulle has said France will not sign. Other members of the force are building airstrips for jet planes and facilities to double Papeete’s harbour capacity.