ALL-POWERFUL SOVIET

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXIII, 4 December 1940, Page 3

ALL-POWERFUL SOVIET

CONDITIONS IN LITHUANIA A vivid description of the situation j in Lithuania, where all power is now in Soviet hands, is given in the newspaper “Svenska Dagbladet.” It takes weeks, it states, to get -even j the smallest things dealt with, because | everybody is afraid to take the respon- ! sibility and cringes before the Russians. I Lithuania’s real masters. In Kuanas, the capital, many houses have been i'e- ! quisitioned by the Russian authorities or officers and the ocupantr* forced to leave. Everywhere lorries can be seen carrying the furniture which the poor inhabitants hope to save. The streets are filled with the new adherents of the Soviet, while thou sands of people, including men ol'! science, clergymen, lawyers, journalists, civil servants and students have been forcibly moved to the interior of Russia.; Among them are M. Merkys, the former i President, and M. Urbsys, the former j Foreign Minister. Sentiment among the peasants is bad. They stay at home and sabotage occurs : often in spite of the strong guards and measures <nken by the authorities. Agrarian i m is about to be introduced 1 and the peasants are making an ener- j getic struggle against it. The harvest l is bad, especially as regards cattle fodder, and the peasants are leaving crops on the fields as a protest. Small farms and great manors have been taken over by unskilled Russians. The peasants consider it preferable to kill and eat their cattle rather than deliver them up to the authorities. This is resulting in scarcity of food and the introduction of rationing.