DE GAULLE AND ALLIES

Greymouth Evening Star, 15 June 1944, Page 5

DE GAULLE AND ALLIES

CHALLENGE IN NORMANDY administrators appointed LONDON, June 14. Th' 71 French Provisional G® 7 ®. l m ment at Algiers has appointed civil mid military administrators or the liberated regions of Normandy, and ns Served notice that it expects the AUief’to respect its authority within France. M. Francois Coulet, who was formerly Secretary-General m Corsica, has been appointed civil administrotor, and. Colonel Pierre de Chevigny military . ? d^ ir ?h?Free Colonel de Chevigny .i°med French forces m June, 1940, and be came chief of staff to General CatL<The diplomatic correspondent of “The Times” says: “Four Allied Governments in London have informed the French leaders that they recognise the title of Provisional Government of the French Republic, the Polish decision was made known verbally to General de Gaulle by the Polish President (Mr Racidewicz), who is sending formal notification by letter. The Czech, Belgian, and Luxembourg Foreign Ministers to-day presented letters of recognition to; the French Provisional Government’s representative with the Allied governments. The Czech Foreign Minister said his Government was pleased to see in the new title a more precise description of ’the situation which already exists, i The Belgian Foreign Minister referred to the Provisional Govern-! ment as ‘the organisation qualified to ensure French participation in the. war effort and the defence of French I interests.’ The Luxemburg letter was similarly worded.” In the House of Commons, Mr Churchill urged members not to press for a debate'on relations with the French. This, he said, might emphasise the difficulties which existed. It was oetter to allow the present relationship lo develop further. A solution could be better achieved if the issue were not threshed out in the House of Commons.

Asked for an assurance that there would be no difficulties preventing General, de Gaulle from landing in France, Mr Churchill said: “That question is one which I.hope will be found capable of solution.”

DE GAULLE IN NORMANDY

(Rec. 11.40 a.m.) LONDON, June 14. General de Gaulle has landed in Normandy, according to the Algiers radio.

De Gaulle landed from the French destroyer La Combattante. He*was accompanied by high ranking French officers, and is expected to stay in Normandy for several days.

The British United Press correspondent says that de Gaulle returned to French soil exactly four years and one day from the moment when he sat in the old Loire Chateau and heard Weygand say: “There is nothing to do. We must give up.” Mr. Churchill was also there that day and as he bowed French leaders filed out to their doom, do Gaulle approached and asked the Prime Minister if he would support the resistance movement.

GUARDING PETAIN

(Rec. 10.10 a.m.) LONDON, June 14. The Germans have thrown a heavy guard around the Vichy Headquarters of the Petain-Laval regime. The main defenders of the town are units of the Nazi S.S. Guard. Special precautions have been taken against Allied paratroop landings. According to reports from Switzerland these defence measures have been caused by the widespread revolts in the Eastern and Southern provinces of France. Mass arrests of French citizens have filled to suppress the movement.

The Swiss reports add that French land workers, railwaymen and police are flocking to !he patriot forces. The main centres of the present Partisan activity are in tne pi evinces of Dauphine, Savoy and Jura, mid near the Spanish border. Near the Swiss border about 159,000 I'rei’.chmen who fled from German conscription have bandel together in the mountains. They ar? believed io bo well armeii with moder i weapons dropped by the Allies in the past year. WEYGAND SHOT. LONDON, June 14. According to the Zurich correspondent ol the “Manchester Guardian,” General Weygand, Allied Com-mander-in-Chief when France collapsed four years ago, is reported to have been shot by the Germans. French officers imprisoned at Konigsberg were told by the Germans that General Weygand was shot while attempting to escape. A French orderly officer who recently returned from Konigsberg said that the German military authorities made the statement in a circular distributed to French officer prisoners; General Weygand and his wife were last reported to be living in an hotel in the Tyrol.