TURMOIL IN ITALY

Evening Post, Volume XCVIII, Issue 137, 8 December 1919, Page 7

TURMOIL IN ITALY

SOCIALISTS ORDER A GENERAL STRIKE

FATAL CONFLICTS IN THE CITIES

BOLSHEVISM EULOGISED.

(UNITED PRESS ASSOCIATION.—COPSRIGHT.)

(ABSTRALIAS-NEW ZBALAND CABLE ASSOCIATION.) ROME, 3rd December.

Despite a general strike having been proclaimed by the Socialists, all the public services are working normally. Elaborate military preparations have. been made to maintain order, including mach-ine-guns in the streets. Cavalry and armoured cars are patrolling the principal thoroughfares. There have been frequent collisions between the strikers and the police in Rome, Milan, and Turin, six having been killed and many wounded. Mobs tried to prevent the departure of trains.

The strike spread to Genoa, Alessandria, Bologna, Civita Vecchia, but generally, the position is less acute. Tlie newspapers are publishing again. (I'.SUTin'S TELEGRAM.)

ROME, 3rd December.

_ When the Chamber resumed its sittings after the strike proclamation, the Socialists protested against the beatings they had received during the street demonstrations.

The oity walls were placarded with manifestos eulogising Bolshevism and -imploring the workers to act without delay in supporting their Russian brethren.

The President (Signor Orlando) invited the Socialists to take oath that they conformed individually, with" the reservation, for instance : "I swear, but falsely."

Signor Nitti (Premier), replying to the Socialists' complaints, deplored the beatings they had received in the streets, and urged them to moderate their language if they did not wish to provoke disorders.