Position In Germany Causing Anxiety, British Minister Says

Greymouth Evening Star, 5 April 1948, Page 5

Position In Germany Causing Anxiety, British Minister Says

(Recd. 10.20 a.m.) LONDON, April 4. The position in Germany was causing anxiety, said the Minister of Defence, Mr A. V. Alexander, speaking at Kilmarnock. There was no limit to which Britain was not prepared to go for the* sake of peace, I ’provided we are not asked to he down and be walked upon. By our endeavours to trade with Russia, Poland and Jugoslavia we have proved our bona fides. It is not Britain s or Mi Bevm s fault that we have arrived at the present situation. A British Foreign Office spokesman said that the situation in Berlin was causing some inconvenience, but it was not one which could not be solved. Official reports reaching London showed that the situation was normal except for a temporary hold-up of some trains. The Allied Kommandatura was functioning normally.

Major-General Neville Brownjohn, the British Deputy-Military Governor, said he believed that the Russian traffic regulations were designed to make the Western Allies’ position in Berlin untenable, and to demonstrate to the Germans that the Russians had power over the Western authorities.; “The timing fits in very nicely with the Italian elections,” he said.; “Frankly, I see no way out of the impasses unless the Russians take a more reasonable view. Ye are not going to change our view _ in the present circumstances. We intends to show that we are not going to be. bullied.” I Major-General Brownjohn nevertheless deplored the way a section 01.

the press abroad was “playing up” the situation so as to imply that actu?fl battle preparations had begem. There was nothing in the Russian regulations to suggest that properly documented freight for Berlin would be stopped. The Russians had simply requested passes for passengers, which was the same as the situation had been since the occupation. The British were willing to present passes to Russian guards as before, but could not tolerate the Russians’ entering British military trains to disturb women and children and possibly order them off for alleged infractions. He added that Berlin was no more a “besieged garrison” than it had ever been.