SOVIET EXCLUDES WEST FROM DANUBE CONTROL

Greymouth Evening Star, 16 August 1948, Page 5

SOVIET EXCLUDES WEST FROM DANUBE CONTROL

! (Rec. 9 a.m.) LONDON, Aug. 14. “The Danube Conference adopted by seven votes to three an article in the new convention limiting membership of the new Danube Commission to Danubian States,” says the Belgrade correspondent of the Associated Press. “The conference rejected an American proposal to establish an 11-member commission i to include Britain, America, France and, after the peace treaty, Germany. “The United States representative (Mr Cavendish Cannon) said that the pact would permit Russia to prac- ■ tise imperialistic discrimination and domination on the Danube. Moving a United States amendment designed : to assure non-discrimination against foreign vessels in the use of port i facilities, Mr Cannon said that the Soviet draft convention was more shadow than substance in the protection of free navigation. | “The Communist bloc _ voted J against the amendment, which was i defeated.” i Reuter’s correspondent m Belgrade ■reports that Sir Charles Peake (Britain), seconding Mr Cannon’s amendment. said that the Soviet diaft would give Russia complete control of the Danube. j “The draft allows as much disI crimination as may at any time suit ' the ends of Soviet acquisitiveness,” he said. “Control of the Danube is !in the hands of the Soviet’s privii leged mixed shipping companies. ' Britain seeks only the same freedom on the Danube as she gives in every United Kingdom port'to ships of all flags without distinction.” Mrs Anna Paulkner (Rumania) said that the Soviet-Rumanian mixed companies were unique in the . world and allowed a Great Power to ! work with a smaller Power in circumstances of complete equality. i The chancellor (Dr Figi) said at a 'political rally at Klagenfurt that , Russian manipulation of the Danube 1 conference at Belgrade threatened the prosperity of every Danubian nation, reports the Associated Press correspondent. Dr Figi demanded that Danube traffic be free and safeguarded by international guarantees.