R.A.F. AIR SERVICE OFFSETS SOVIET TRAFFIC BAN

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22669, 21 June 1948, Page 5

R.A.F. AIR SERVICE OFFSETS SOVIET TRAFFIC BAN

(10 a.m.) LONDON, June 20. The British authorities in Berlin have started an air shuttle service between Britain and the western zone of Berlin following the Soviet ban on road travel because of the currency reform.

The spokesman said that a regular schedule of passenger flights to and from Berlin would be inaugurated as soon as extra planes arrived from Britain.

The R.A.F. Transport Command in Berlin has arranged to fly planes from Britain to provide a link between the British zone and Berlin. Some have already arrived. The Russians barred all nationalities from using the autobahn to Berlin, including Dutch and Swiss diplomatic travellers and allowed only three Yugoslav officers to cross the border.

More than 5000 German civilians and a great line of cars on Saturday was held up or. the Russion side of the frontier at the British control post of Helmstedt vainly trying to cross the border.

German travellers report that the Russians concentrated tanks and armoured cars at the Russian-American zone border near Eisenach.

The British Foreign Office spokesman said the British authorities were consulting French and United States officials in Berlin on the Soviet decision to close the frontier between the western and Soviet zones of Germany. The official Soviet newspaper Taegliche Runschau appeared today with a long article on the currency position in Berlin. The article 'said that those who Btarted a separate currency reform in the west now found themselves confronted by the task of solving the resulting currency situation in Berlin. “We are convinced that these problems are not difficult to solve if all the relevant questions are discussed openly and frankly with the Soviet by the Americans, British and French,” the paper added. The Soviet order states that the decision was taken as a result of the separate currency reform in the western zones and to protect the interests of the population and the economy of the eastern zone and to prevent the disorganisation of currency. The order said that passenger and train traffic in and out of the Soviet zone would be stopped. No entry would be permitted in carts or motor cars. This included traffic on the HelmstadtBerlin motor road. Intrusive Control

Traffic out of Berlin on the motor road would be permitted on the same condition as previously. All forms of water traffic would be subjected to extremely close control. No pedestrians in possession of inter-zonal passes issued in the western zones would be allowed to cross the zonal border. Goods train traffic will continue unhampered but under careful control. The British United Press correspondent in Berlin says that traffic using the Magdeburg ferry—the one-ferry bottleneck which has been in use since the Russians closed the Elbe Bridge—has been so heavy that, according to the ferry captain, the ferry cannot last more than another three days. - The Russian action has severely restricted traffic along the international highway between Berlin and the 'West. General Sir Brian Robertson, the British Military Governor, has offered to lend the Russians British engineers and equipment for building a new bridge or repairing the old bridge or both. The ferry’s deck boards a»e sagging under the abnormally heavy loads.