FOREIGN MINISTERS

Evening Star, Issue 25674, 24 December 1945, Page 5

FOREIGN MINISTERS

INFORMAL TALKS MAKE PROGRESS MIDDLE EAST PROBLEMS MAY BE DIFFICULT (Rec. 11.40 a.m.) LONDON, Dec. 23. The Foreign Ministers to-day concluded the' first week of the threePower Conference with an informal meeting at M. Molotov’s office in the Kremlin, says Reuter’s correspondent; in Moscow. This is the third private session in addition to six formal meetings. American sources continue to suggest that the informal talks are making good progress in “a warm, human atmosphere.” The three Foreign Ministers, after to-day’s talk, attended an official luncheon given by the United States Ambassador, Mr A. Harriman. During the afternoon Generalissimo Stalin received the American Secretary of State, Mr J. F. Byrnes, with M. Molotov. Mr Harriman was also present.

The ‘Observer’s’ diplomatic correspondent says that although a complete official silence is being maintained about the Foreign Ministers’ meetings, indications are available that the most difficult and outstanding issues concern the Middle East. Signs are increasing that Russian policy in Persia aims not only at the virtual separation of Azberbaijan from Persia, blit the installing of a Government of Russian choice in Teheran. The Russian war of nerves against Turkey simultaneously has intensified these moves, and suggests a wish to make the Black Sea a Rus-

sian “ Mare Nostrum,” with its coasts, as a springboard for ex-

panding Russian influence in the Eastern Mediterranean. Such a

policy, would directly threaten the vitals of the British Empire.

The correspondent adds that the contrast between Russia’s forward policy in the Middle East and the moderate policy in the Far East is not overlooked in London. It explains the. certain reserve which London feels regarding the optimistic American forecasts about the Moscow .conference. Britain will not be a party to a Middle East “ Munich.”

According to Moscow radio the Central Committee of Earn sent to the three Allied Foreign Ministers in Moscow a report stating that “armed Royalist Fascist gangs ” in Greece have been spreading terror with impunity, and more than 1,000 Democrats have been killed in the last nine months. The report adds that foreign interference is preventing Greece’s democratic development, and the presence of foreign % troops is steadily becoming more undesirable.