JAPAN AND SOVIET

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 156, 30 December 1940, Page 7

JAPAN AND SOVIET

EVIDENCE OF FRICTION

MOSCOW PRESS ARTICLE

ALARM CAUSED

(By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright.)

LONDON, December 27,

Evidence of friction between Russia and Japan is given by the publicity organs of the two countries. The Japanese newspaper "Nichi Nichi Shimbun" complains that, although the new Japanese Ambassador in Moscow, Lieutenant-General Tatekawa, tried hard, he was unable to improve Japanese relations with the Soviet.

Simultaneously, the Moscow radio stated that anti-war feeling is spreading among the Japanese troops in China, and reported that troops in the employ of the Wang Ching-wei regime had deserted to Marshal Chiang Kai-shek.

It also declares that recent assassinations of Japanese officers in Shanghai were the work of anti-war Japanese.

A long article on Japanese conditions printed in Moscow newspapers described the instability of the new regime, the growing domestic and foreign difficulties, the worsening of the economic and food situation, and mounting discontent over the Chinese war. The article is one of a series, the widespread publication of which is causing alarm among the Japanese.