WRIT SERVED ON SOVIET CONSUL IN U.S.

Greymouth Evening Star, 13 August 1948, Page 7

WRIT SERVED ON SOVIET CONSUL IN U.S.

WASHINGTON, August 11. in New York today a writ of habeas corpus was served on IVIi Jacob Lomakin, Soviet Consul-General, ordering him to produce the kidnapped” Soviet school-teacher, Mrs Kosenkina, in Court tomonow. Mr Lomakin announced later that he would not produce her, cind that as far as he was concerned he had never been served with a writ. In Washington it is announced that a sub-committee of the Un-American Activities Committee of the House of Representatives will go to New York tomorrow to question the other Russian schoolteacher. Mr Mikhail Samarin, and his wife, who sought the protection of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. According to the committee, Mr Samarin is ready to tell it about Soviet designs on America and other countries-. Another sub-committee will go to Ottawa on. an unspecified date to question Mr Igor Gouzenko, the Russian cipher clerk whose testimony precipitated the Canadian spy ring case.

The writ which was served on Mr Lomakin was obtained from the State Supreme Court by Mr Christopher Emmett, chairman of the Board of Common Cause, Incorporated, an anti-Communist organisation, A snokesman for the Board of Common Cause, Incorporated, said: “We are acting on Mrs Kosenkina’s behalf, although, of course, we have no such word from her. All we are trying to do is to get her away from the Consulate so she can tell her story. We are giving her a chance to be free if she really wants to be.” The attorney who served the writ on Mr Lomakin on the Consulate steps said he was acting in accordance with the State Department’s ruling yesterday that persons at the Consulate could be served with legal papers outside the Consulate. He said that if Mr Lomakin failed to produce Mrs Kosenkina to testify in Court tomorrow, “appropriate action would be taken.” Statement By Marshall

The United States Secretary of State (General. Marshall) today said that Russian citizens who wished to remain in the United States in defiance of their,-Government would be protected as long as they complied with United States laws. General Marshall said it was obvious that the Russian Government’s demand that Mr Samarin be released was based on incorrect information, and the charge that he was being held under the control of the American authorities was false. General Marshall said that .he United States Government would nor countenance any action which would interfere with the diplomatic immunity of Soviet persons and premises in the United States. He added that the State Department did not have all the details yet on exactly what had happened in the cases of Mr Samarin and Mrs Kosenkina.

The spy investigation hearings continue in Washington. Miss Elizabeth Bentley, the self-declared former Communist and former Soviet spy, told the Un-American Activities Committee today that a high official of the Soviet Embassy in Washington had given her 2000 dollars in 1945 and told her that his Government had awarded her the Red Star medal for war-time spying in the United States. She also said that she had previously accepted from Communists a fur coat, an air conditioning machine, and expense money. Cryptic Remark She said that an official whom she identified as Mr Anatol Gromov, formerly Second Secretary and later First Secretary at the Russian Embassy, had practically forced her to take the 2000 dollars with the cryptic remark to the effect that she would be a traitor to Russia if she did not. •'I knew what that meant,” she Miss Bentley said that all personal allegations made against her were “false, without a shadow of doubt. Several of the Federal employees accused by her of spying have said m evidence that she is a liar, called her neurotic, and emotionally frustrated, and said she has “unpleasant drinking habits.”