PRISONERS’ TRIAL

Hokitika Guardian, 13 April 1933, Page 5

PRISONERS’ TRIAL

SOVIET CHARGES

HOUSE OF LORDS’ DISCUSSION

(United Press Association—By Electric

Telegraph—Copyright)

LONDON, April 11

Sir Esmond Ovey and Sir John Simon listened to the Russia debate in •the House of Lords.

Moving the second reading of the Russian Imports Prohibition Bill, in tlie Lords, Lord Hailsham said that the Soviet owed Vickers at the end of lust month, no less than a million and a half sterling, and the company had every reason to expect a continuance of the contracts. The economic power conferred by the Bill was perhaps the only form of pressure the Government could use to protect British subjects who were in peril. Lord Halisham said that the Government had tbe right to demand that British subjects arrested in a foreign country should be tried by an impartial tribunal, and the evidence presented slioul* 1 be reliably obtained. The danger of the present case was that neither condition could operate.

“Nothing could bo more cruel and cowardly than the way the men arrested in Moscow have been tortured,” he said, The Soviet Minister of Justice had laid, it dqwn that the Courts woro the organs of State power. Their duty was not to determine guilt, but to decide whether a conviction would be in the interests of tbe administration.

Lord Pnssfield (Labour) suggested that the matter could have been better handled by friendly representations, instead of holding a machine-gun at the’Soviet’s head. The Russian procedure. was not half as had as that practised in Poland and the United States. Our own police had been guilty of much the same sort of treatment.

Lord Buckmaster said that Lord Passfield’s utterance might he harmless before a debating society, but it was dangerous under the present circumstances.

The Bill passed all its stages. , The gravest public impression was caused by the second white paper, which disclosed inter alia, that the strong undercurrent of menaces during some of the examinations of Vickers’ engineers, was alternated with promises of lucrative employment in return for satisfactory answers.

WEB IMPLICATES ACCUSED,

THE BASIS OF! THE TRIALS

LONDON, April 11

The “Times’ ’’ Riga, correspondent recalls that all the “wrecker” trials are based on the prisoners’ confessions, which were secured by the O.G.P.U. There is a web implicating all of the accused, When the prisoners showed a disposition to deny the confessions, a night spent in O.G.P.U, cells resulted in an, alteration of their attitude.

'The correspondent adds: The alleged wrecker trials are not trials in an ordinary sense, hut are public demonstration of guilt, which lias officially been decided and proclaimed in advance. The whole Court, even defending Counsel, are ranged' on the side of the prosecution. AVhon two defence barristers at a Shakhintinsky trial in 1928, broke harmony with attempted pleas of innocence of the accused, M. Vishinsky, the judge, ordered their immediate arrest and trial -for collusion in disloyalty to the Soviet. Mr Strang will attend the present trials. Members of the British Embassy staff and a stenographer will also be present.

MRS MONKHOUSE’S PLIGHT.

CONVERSATION WITH HUSBAND.

LONDON, April 11

Mrs Monkhouse wife of the arrested engineer who is living in Hertforshire, had her last talk with her husband in Moscom before the trial. He said he was not allowed to refer to the trial, hut spoke to her about his will and all arrangements in case of—Mrs Monkhiuse was unable to finish the sentence. She said she had been married twenty years, and had a girl oil eighteen and a hoy of twelve. She was not disturbed about the Soviet suggestions concerning her husband. He was incapable of deceit. Madame Ivutosova, the secretary mentioned in the white paper, was her friend. She added she had a visa ready to go to Moscow, but her husband said her presence would cause him anxiety and embarrassment. “So,” she said, “I am waiting. 1 have wept for a month. I will not weep any more.

He asked me to keep calm. Ido not believe they will shoot him, but if they can arrest, they can shoot. Wlmt can T do” SOVIET PRESS RETICENT.

MOSCOW, April 11

There is nothing in to-day’s newspaper relating to the trial to-morrow. This is interpreted as the official desire to' minimise possibility of crowds of workers flocking to the courtroom

in Nobles’ Hall which has accommodation for uOO.

MOSCOW TRIAL BEGINS

LONG SUMMARY INDICTMENT,

'/Received April 13 at 8 a.m.) LONDON, April 12. The Moscow trial began at noon