THE SOVIET MANIA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVI, Issue 17189, 17 June 1919, Page 8

THE SOVIET MANIA.

MOVEMENT IN GERMANY.

RIOTS AND BLOODSHED.

Strikes and counter-strikes are still die* organising various industries'in Westphalia., and the general unrest is in no wuo diminished, hut there is less fear, for tha moment at least, of armed insurrection, •wrote a correspondent from Cologne under date April 9. Rigid measures of popular control are being enforced in man}' towns. Essen is held by a mixed forte of infantry and artillery, and all the usual restrictions of a state of siege were put into operation to-day. This measure was hastened by a conflict between strikers and Government troops, when the latter entered the town yesterday. An attempt was made to plunder a transport waggon containing rations lor soldiers, and in t'.o struggle which ensued bombs were thrown by civilians, which killed two of their number, and wounded four others. The total number of strikers in the Essen area shows a decrease to-day of about a thousand. Mulheim-on-Ruhr, on the other hand, is completely disorganised by a ceneral strike, which 6pread within twenty-four hours to al! tlio public services. To-day the town is without light, heat, or water. The arrest and removal of I>s Spar'aeisS ringleaders to a fortress at Wesel precipitated the strike at llu'.heim. One of tho prisoners being a railway man all the railway employees have decided to come cut to-morrow, and the railway shops are already closed. The wor>:--ncn. influenced by Spartiuußte, demand the release of all political prisoners, and a telegram has been tent-to tho Berlin Government insisting on tho immediate withdrawal of tha Government troops from the neighbouring towns. Bochnm and Dusseldorf are Iwpt in order by the military. Al! the mines round about are to bo policed by troops, and kept working wherever a 'sufficientnumber of men can he induced to return.

The streets ore patrolled at night by sentries, who haw orders to shoot all pergot is refusing to halt and give an account) of themselves. The commander of Bueseldorf announces" that the slightest Sparta* cist disorder will be ruthlessly suppressed. Altogether an Army Corps pi Government troops' ie reported to bo. allotted to'''. Westphalia to protect its vital industries a;;ot put down Bolshevist disorders*-