THE NORTHERN ADVOCATE Registered for transmission through the Post as a newspaper. SATURDAY AUGUST 21, 1948. East And West At Variance

Northern Advocate, 21 August 1948, Page 4

THE NORTHERN ADVOCATE Registered for transmission thr ough the Post as a newspaper. SATURDAY AUGUST 21, 1948. East And West At Variance

The relationship between Russia and the Western Powers remains obscured, and all who are hoping for a happy deliverance from the serious international trouble that undoubtedly exists have cause for watching with anxiety developments in widely separated areas. According to Reuters correspondent. opinion in Paris is optimistic regarding the Moscow talks, about which much has been heard during the week. Sources of information are said to have declared that a substantial measure of agreement has already been reached, and other reports suggest another conference which may possibly re-establish the situation existing at the time the last meeting of Foreign Ministers collapsed. There is apparently a feeling that a conference may take place during the week-end, and it is significant that the British Foreign Secretary, Mr Ernest Bevin, is remaining in London to await developments. That the atmosphere remains electrical there is no doubt, which makes more serious the differences between the United States Administration and the Soviet Consul-General in that country.

As an outcome of the “kidnapping” of Russian school teachers, one of whom jumped from a third-storey window of a building in which she

was allegedly being held prisoner, a serious diplomatic situation has been created.

The Soviet Consulate authorities have not only demanded the surrender of the school teachers, who have been given asylum by the United States, but have taken measures of a police character to seize the refugees by force. This action by foreign agents has been condemned by the United States Government, which has taken the extreme step of ordering the immediate recall of the Soviet Con-sul-General.

The State Department had ruled that Mrs Kosenkina, who is critically ill as a result of jumping from a window to escape from Russian hands, is not subject to the control of the Soviet Government while she remains in the United States, which led not only to reprimanding the Soviet officials, but demanding that the Consul-General should be recalled by Moscow.

A development of this kind was not calculated to improve prospects for a satisfactory solution of the Russo-Western Powers’ grave problem affecting Berlin, and it is therefore not surprising to learn from a late London cable message that the hoped-for conference between the Powders is not at all likely to take place.