AMNESTY BILL

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 24 June 1937, Page 7

AMNESTY BILL

WAR-TIME TRAITORS VIGOROUS PROTEST IN BELGIUM DEMONSTRATION BY EX-SERVICE-MEN CLASH WITH POLICE i [United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright! (Received 24th June, 10.50 a.m.) BRUSSELS, 23rd June. Maintaining resentment against the amnesty legislation, 20.000 former soldiers providing themselves with food and bedding, marched on the capital in order to protest. They assembled at the Tomb of the .Unknown Soldier, broke the police cordon and advanced upon the Houses of Parliament, though the latter was not sitting, and the Premier, M. Van Zeeland, is in America. Mounted and foot police charged and arrested many and injured others. Firemen dispersed the crowds with hoses. A delegation then demanded an audience with King Leopold to urge the withdrawal of the amnesty, the resignation of the Government and the dissolution of Parliament.

Disorders continued and severe street fighting necessitated further police charges in order to disperse demonstrators in front of the Government buildings and the Royal Palace. Troops have now been dispatched to the scene of the disturbances. CALMER COUNSELS PREVAILING [United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright' (Received 24th June, 2 p.m.) BRUSSELS, 23rd June. Calmer counsels prevailing, the delegation seated itself on the pavement to await the return of King Leopold from the country. He eventually promised its members that he would do everything it was possible for a constitutional monarch to do. An incident in the demonstration was 100 ex-servicemen lying down on a footpath in parallel lines that extended across the road from the Palace gates to the park entrance, blocking all traffic.

A cable message from Brussels dated 9th June stated that armoured cars and police were rushed to the scene when 300 Croix De Feu ex-servicement marched past the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and flung their medals on the grave as a protest against the Bill passed in the Chamber of Deputies, and which was then before the Senate, pardoning war-time traitors who attempted, with German help, to create an independent State. The ex-servicemen were eventually admitted to the Senate and allowed to protest against the passage of the Bill, after which they returned to the Tomb and swore in French and Flemish to shoot the traitors if the Bill were passed.