THE SOVIET REGIME.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18192, 11 September 1922, Page 10

THE SOVIET REGIME.

EARLY PASSING EXPECTED.

DOMINATION OF MINORITY. 'Awaiting an opportunity to resume work there are gathered in Harbin, in Northern Manchuria, representatives of powetful commercial and mining organisations.- of all nations, whose huge capital was invested in Siberia under the old regime, said Mr. C. H, Kerry, in his address at the annual meeting in Sydney of the MaJaya Tin Corporation, Limited, which holds considerable mining concesoessiom; in Siberia, These advance agents of .commerce, Mr. Kerry said, believed that the days of Sovietism were numbered, and that the Bolsheviks, who were only 5 per cent, of the community, could not much longer impose their will on the other 95 per cent, merely because they bold at the moment all the arms and ammunition, and control the currency and means of transport. A* theirs waa probably the only company' in the Commonwealth having important interests in Siberia, the present position there would be of interest to shareholders.

Their manager had recently penetrated 2000 miles into Central Siberia to th« capital, Omsk. According to hia record it was a conntry where «aw and order were unknown and justice did not exist, where disease and starvation were everywhere, and the only cheap commodity was human life. Previously Siberia was known as the granary of Europe, and its trade in food products was enormous—today cannibalism was common. Gold roubles were so scarce that it was now , a crime to own or hold them, while the present Soviet currency was so depreciated that recently, in a settlement of a debt for £400, the company paid an equivalent in paper roubles of £4,000 000 *nvth?nT? haß mi , neral riches far beyond *JVwi h,n ß, know n elsewhere in the world. . m r Cs are idle > with millions

To comply with a demand of the Soviet authont.es in Omsk, Mr. Kerry adJed l':,T Pa?y b f\ agaia «gistere/ite hold: ings of mineral le*** and formally ten dered payment of all lease rent! „d charges Further « a a dum of one milium roubles had been lodged against any possible nationalisation of the property and plant. At the in stance of the Commonwealth Government t*e claim for this amount had been repeated here.