RUSSIAN CONSPIRACY

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXIII, Issue 11945, 16 May 1933, Page 3

RUSSIAN CONSPIRACY

PLOT AGAINST BRITAIN LONDON, May 4. Revelations at Moscow, says tie Riga correspondent of The Times, show that, although the Soviet is m,w holding Thornton and MacDonald to ransom, the arrest of the Vickers en gineers was originally part of a large er plot. The plot, it is stated, was formed alter the 'publication in London in November of an article urging the separation of Ukraine from the Soviet, which tiie Soviet believed British ‘’■die-hards” and bankers initiated and supposed, iwith a view to revolt and establishing! an independent. Ukraine.

“Jzvestia’s” attack on tho British Government in November was one of the opening moves of tlve campaign to teach Britain a lesson. The Ogpu (secret police) was ordered to ferret out tho separatist leaders in the Ukraine who had recently boon embarrassing the Soviet, resulting in many arrests and the execution of ,‘SG peasant officials without a /rial, including Konar, Deputy-Com-missioner of Agriculture, and a prominent commissar, whom the Ogpu “incriminated” as a member <>f an organisation coni fed in London. The Soviet newspapers, in their first announcements, linked the *rrested engineers with; the executed Ukrainians, alleging that the British had organised sabotage in order to cripple the Soviet in the Ukraine s coming war of independence. Tho Ogpu effort io establish a direct connection failed, however, ow- . ing to the haste with which if was forced io prepare Ike trial owing to British pressure .