TEACHER’S ARREST.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIV, Issue 111, 10 April 1934, Page 3

TEACHER’S ARREST.

COMMUNISM IN JAPAN. FRIEND EXPRESSES FEARS. A vivid impression of the detestation which the Japanese authorities have for Communism, and of the difliculties which may lie ahead of Mr W. M. Bickerton, formerly of Christchurch, who has been arrested in Tokio on suspicion of being engaged in Communist activities, was given in Christchurch by Mr lan R. Little, who has just returned from a business trip to Japan, and had a personal acqaintanco with Mr Bickerton in Tokio. Mr Little scouted the suggestion that Mr Bickerton had been actually engaged in Communist activities. But, he added, the arrested teacher had made a study of Communism and Russian principles, and it needed only a breath of suspicion to bring the Japanese authorities into action. “Mr Bickerton would not be interested enough in Communism to take any active part,”' Mr Little said confidently. “He appreciated how dangerous it would bo even to mention anything like Communism there, and lie was very careful. I am satisfied that there is nothing in any suggestion that he gavo money to somo needy Communist, or had anything to do with Communists. “I have a cutting which says that the authoritise have confiscated several things found in Mr Biekcrton’s house. No doubt, as a detached student of Russia, lie possessed books on the subject, and it is my impression that these would he sufficient to incriminate him in the eyes of the Japanese. When it comes to Communism, the Japanese authorities need only suspicion to make them go ‘right off the deep end.’ ”

Mr Little expressed the opinion that there was a troubled time ahead for Mr Bickerton. Another European in Japan, he said, once fell into casual conversation with a Rusisan in a big hotel. The Japanese police got on to the European’s track, and scarcely let him out o' their sight for two years. Every morning they called at his house to sec that he was still there.