DENIAL BY BYRNES

Greymouth Evening Star, 30 May 1946, Page 7

DENIAL BY BYRNES

ANSWER TO MOLOTOV’S CHARGES

NO BRITISH-AMERICAN BLOC WASHINGTON, May 28.

The United States Secretary of State (Mr. James Byrnes), replying to Mr. Molotov’s broadcast statement, denied the existence of a British-Ameri-can bloc. ** Mr. Molotov said that a BritishAmerican bloc had waged an offensive against Russia at the Paris conference of the Big Four Foreign Ministers. Mr. Byrnes said that Mr. Molotov must have been misquoted in his reported statement that Mr. Stalin had not promised to support the American proposal for a 25-year treaty to keep Germany disarmed. If he had not been misquoted, then there must be some misunderstanding. ■ Mr. Byrnes said that in Moscow on December 24, 1945, Mr. Stalin was asked whether the Soviet would consider a treaty among the four principal Powers for the demilitarisation of Germany a good thing. Mr. Stalin had stated unequivocally that if Mr. Byrnes formally made the proposal he would support it. Mr. Byrnes sent his draft treaty to Moscow on February 14,1946, with a letter pointing out that Mr. Stalin had agreed to it in principle. This statement had not been refuted. Mr. Molotov, in Paris, had not denied Mr. Stalin’s adoption of the proposal in principle.

Mr. Byrnes added that because Mr. Molotov had urged that the immediate disarmament of Germany should first be considered, he had asked the American military representative (Lieutenant-General Lucius Clay) to raise with the Allied Control Council in Berlin the question of appointing deputies to report on the progress of disarmament, including the operation of arms plants in all the zones of Germany. Britain and France had agreed to this proposal, but Russia had refused, contending that the investigation should not include war plants.