HARROWING SCENES

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 99, 24 October 1938, Page 9

HARROWING SCENES

FALL OF CANTON

THOUSANDS HOMELESS

THE CITY CALM

OCCUPATION COMPLETED

By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. LONDON, October 23. Tokio reports that .the occupation of Canton by the Japanese has been completed. Four thousand Chinese dead were found in the eastern district. The Japanese lost 50 men. Reuters' Canton correspondent says that there were harrowing scenes in the city, where thousands of homeless Chinese were huddled in the streets without food. Hundreds who were maimed after the bombings have been turned out of the hospitals, whose staffs have been evacuated. A thousand prisoners liberated from the civil gaol are among the aimless throng. A small mechanised unit which obstructed the Japanese advance to the city was wiped out. The city is reported to be calm, and the Japanese are continuing to enter from the east. " REFUGEE ZONES. The Japanese have agreed to establish four refugee zones in the city, as proposed by the British and American Consular authorities. The Japanese report that General Yu Han-mou, General Chiang Kaishek's pacification commissioner and commander of the Kwantung Army, decided to surrender to Japan, but the Chinese deny this story, A message from Hong Kong says that Mr. Eugene Chen, Mayor of Canton, demands the dismissal of General Chiang Kai-shek. The British naval authorities at Shanghai have refused a Japanese request to move shipping either' from Hankow or the Pearl River at Canton. HONG KONG'S POSITION. The Japanese Consul in Hong Kong emphasises that Japan's desire is not to embarrass Hong Kong, • where authorities discount the pessimistic theories of economic repercussions, and point out that Hong Kong depends financially on shipping and banking, which is now more likely to increase.