PETAIN AND GERMANS

Greymouth Evening Star, 4 December 1940, Page 7

PETAIN AND GERMANS

VERSAILLES INSTALLATION [BY CABLE. —PRESS ASSN. —COPYRIGHT.] LONDON, December 3. Marshal Petain, head of the French Government, is shortly to be installed at Versailles, in the midst of his German masters. This latest move by the Germans is viewed with misgiving by those Frenchmen who are alive to the possibility of Germany succeeding in embroiling France with Britain. It is not clear from the veiled communique announcing the fo.'thcoming move to Versailles whether Marshal Petain is to be accompanied by his Cabinet, but it is certain that what measures of independence Vichy has so far had will now disappear. If Marshal Petain goes alone he will be isolated from those members of the Cabinet who have been able, to some extent, to curb the acitvities of M. Laval. With Marshal Petain under their control the Germans will have an asset in helping to check the rising spirit of resistance throughout the country. Evidence of the increasing resistance has been given by the Germancontrolled Lyon radio, which said that unless the French co-operated with the Germans the whole of France would be occupied, the 2,000,000 French prisoners of war would be kept in concentration camps for life, and French youth would be sent to break stones.

COMMUNISTS ARRESTED. LONDON, December 2. The “Daily Telegraph” states: Hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of Communists have been arrested in France as a result of a recrudescence of Communist propaganda. Those arrested include Louis Thorez, brother of Maurice Thorez. ;