THE PART OF RUSSIA

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 31, 7 February 1927, Page 9

THE PART OF RUSSIA

LITVINOFF'S DENIAL

LONDON, 4th February.

The agitation by a section of the Press in England in,favour of the abrogation of the Anglo-Bussian trade agreement is apparently causing some uneasiness in. Moscow, judging by a lengthy statement made by the ActingForeign Commissary, SI. Litvinoff, transmitted from Moscow. Beviewing the situation in China, M. LitvinofE professed to regret that the coupling of the peace negotiations with threats of intimidation and military intervention had caused a breakdown. He asserted that the British Conservatives were now trying to shift their own mistake on to the shoulders of the Soviet Government by ridiculous legends that the Chinese Nationalist movement was due to the machinations of Soviet agents. The Soviet Government sympathised with the Chinesa liberative movement, but it in-noirise followed that it recommended the Canton Government to strain its relations with Britain, or ihat it should stand in the way of a peaceful agreement with Britain.

M. Litvinoff declared tliat the Soviet Government never forgot its obligations under the Anglo-Russian treaty in 1921. The straining of Anglo-Kussian relations would be a blow to the interests not only of the whole of Britain, but also of those of the very financial industrial groups which were now most loudly demanding a rupturo of relations.