JEWS IN CZECHOSLOVAKIA

Greymouth Evening Star, 12 February 1940, Page 8

JEWS IN CZECHOSLOVAKIA

MORE REPRESSIVE MEASURES

[BY CABLE—-PBESS ASSN. —-COPYBIGHT.]

PRAGUE, February 11. Baron Von Neurath, the Protector*, has. announced., that.. Jews are ... being eliminated. ..froiiri-...the. Protectorate s life. Jewish textile, clothing, and leather goods stores are to 'close on March. 1,. after which, the Protector is empowered to close all Jewish-, businesses.' The; registration is ; announced- of all Jewish:, shareholdings;? in, real?- estate, giving, with the present control- of the-Jewish banks therein-, a? complete- hold: over Jews iri-Pragtie; w The Gestapo has filled three. hundred Jews, ant] also is.■.bringing pressure to bear on Jews, individually; ordering them all to get-out, .and. saying - that they can illegally, go: to Palestine; • The German authorities as a protective measure, took-into? custody between five and- six hundred leading Czechs; including- Joseph Thruslar, leader of the Czech national movement, and 120 former Czech officers; MERGED' INTO REICH' BERLIN, February IL ’. Bdhemia and Moravia are tq. be incorporated in the Reich Customs Union on April 1. NUNS IN POLAND. NEW YORK, February 10.

Two’ American Franciscan nuns have returned by the. liner Saturnia. They" came from Poland. They told how Nazis seized the Church and convent of their order 16'' miles from Warsaw, although, they personally had not been molested. They said that the nuns in the Corridor and in Danzig have been forced to adopt civilian clothes.

ARMY OF “COOLIES.”

RUGBY, February. 10

Details have just become known in London of a German Tarifordnung of January 8, -which, in effect, reduces to; the status- of coolies,. Czech, Polish and Jewish workers in Germany. The decree, which was. published in. the “Reichs Aaroeitsblatt” on January 15, Over the signature of Herr Daeschner as Sondertreuhander Der Arbert, places in the special category of the Abeiter Zweiter Klasse all agricultural workers in the Reich not possessing German citizenship, except those' einployed under State contract. They will be paid at a lower rate, and are not entitled to overtime. About one and a-half million Poles, several hundred thousand Czechs and ten thousand Jews are affected. German workers incurring the displeasure of the regime run the danger of being sent to join this army of outcasts.

ACCUSATIONS AGAINST ’"POLES

(Reed.-Feb'. 12> Noon).

BERLIN, February 11.

A new. edition of the Foreign Office publication “Polish Atrocities Against Germans in Poland,” alleges that the Poles murdered 58,000 of the German Minority during September. The Germans first officially claimed 5,487 were murdered, but amended the figure later to' 12,000.

The new edition alleges that even the new figure of 58,000 is not final, because, hundreds of mass graves were discovered which cannot be opened until Spring, on account of the weather.”