STRONG RELATIONS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 190, 13 July 1936, Page 7

STRONG RELATIONS.

“BOUND BY FATE.”

PRO-GERMANISM IN VIENNA

LONDON, July If

At Berlin Dr.' Goebbels spoke lor three minutes, prefixing his reading of the communique with the remark that tho agreement represents a further practical step toward the peaceful lessening of tension and the disentanglement of tho European situation. At Vienna Dr. Sehusehnigg declared that the agreement ensured European peace, adding: “Eatc binds both German peoples together. Everyone, no matter what liis former attitudes was, will bo welcome in co-operation in tlie Fatherland Front. I can confidently state that Austria’s peaceful development will continue. Despite all that lias happened the old Austro-German cultural relations are strong enough to enable us to come to a friendly agreement with Germany. I greet all Germans inside and outside our frontiers.” Dr. Scliuschnigg added that lie had nothing to say altering Dr. Dollfuss’s conception. The Austrians, while German people, were not a German nation., The Government were determined to defend their independence with all possible means. “There can be no place in Austria for Nazism or other extremists sowing discord and hate, who will also ho proceeded against relentlessly. Austria, as a’ member of the League, will fulfil all her obligations.” The first fruits of the agreement are believed to bo seen in the appointment of Herron Edmund Horstenau and Guido Schmidt as Ministers without portfolio. Herr Horstenau, director of tjie Austrian war archives, is outspokenly pro-German and is regarded as the confidential representatives ol the German Government in tlie Austrian Cabinet in pursuance of a reported agreement that tho Ministry will include a representative approved by Germany. Herr Schmidt, also proGerman, hitherto a high official of the Chancellery, has now been promoted to tho Secretaryship of Foreign Affairs.

At Berlin a German spokesman, summarising the results of the agreement, expressed the opinion that the newspapers of both countries would he readmitted to the other. Austria would remit the 1000 marks tax on visiting Germans, an amnesty lor political prisoners would he arranged, and both nations would he permitted to show their national emblems within the others’ borders. He added that tlie agreement was not made in response to the British questionnaire, but was a confirmation of Germany’s peaceful intentions. The Berlin correspondent of the Times, writing before the agreement was announced, said it was wellknown that Hr. Von Papon (German Ambassador) had been trying for a long time to reach an arrangement with Dr. Schuschnigg for improving Austro-German economic relations, but it seemed that the purpose of this was merely to facilitate a German reply to the British questionnaire. If an Austro-German economic agreement was reached, it was pointed out, Germany could argue that there need be no anxiety over middle European pacts to secure Austrian independence as the two countries were capable of arranging matters between themselves.