ALLEGED ATROCITIES.

Manawatu Times, Volume 62, Issue 3, 5 January 1937, Page 2

ALLEGED ATROCITIES.

A REIGN OF TERROR. YUGOSLAVS’ STORIES. Yugoslavian immigrant* in Western Australia want the League of Nations to Investigate a “reign of terror" In their homeland. At a meeting at Perth storiee were told of alleged atrocities. Newly-arrived immigrants who had flad from Yugoslavia, It was said, told of a Fasolst terror of increasing ferooity, although many were reluctant to make their statements public owing to the fear that their relatives in Yugoslavia would be subject to reprisals. An outline of terrors practised upon political prisoners was given by one young man who recently fled from his country after undergoing a term of Imprisonment. Minor Tortures. "I was myself a witness," he said, "of what were regarded as minor tortures—the ripping off of a prisoner’s fingernails, burning of the soles of the feet with ted-hot irons, pulling of the hair out by the roots and floggings wjth butts of guns. “The Press of Europe and of the world does not hear details of the martyrdom of the people of Yugoslavia, and it is imperative that democratic peoples should be brought to a realisation of the position. “Much of the immigration of Yugoslavian people’ to-day is the immigration of a people endeavouring to escape from terror.”

The following resolutions were carried unanimously, with instructions that they be sent to the Western Australian branch of the League of Nations Union to be forwarded to the League Union at Geneva —

Appeal to Lsagu*.

“That the League of Nations *end a commission to investigate the political and social position in Yugoslavia.

“That the League Jake immediate steps to stop the terrorism in Yugoslavia, and make overtures so that full amnesty be granted to political and military prisoners who have been •so inhumanly treated." In a letter to the State branch ol the League of Nations Union an offei was made by Yugoslavian immigrants to submit evidenoe to the League ©d the subject of the protest.