AMERICAN REPUBLICS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21293, 21 September 1932, Page 9

AMERICAN REPUBLICS

BOLIVIA AND PARAGUAY

A TEN DAYS' BATTLE

CHARGES OF ATROCITIES.

By Telegraph—Press Association—' Copyright NEW YORK. Sept. 19

A message from Asuncion, Paraguay, says the Minister of War, Dr. Luis A. Riart, to-day charged the Bolivian troops at Fort Boqueron, in the Chaco region, with decapitating Paraguayan prisoners taken during the 10 days' battle which has been raging there.

In denying the reports of inhuman acts by Paraguayan troops, the Minister said a Bolivian airman bombed a Red Cross hospital and riddled it with machine-gun fire and that Bolivians used explosive bullets, mutilating the bodies of the dead.

The present crisis occurred just _as Bolivia and Paraguay were ready to sign a pact of non-aggression. Paraguay claimed the Carlos Lopez fort in the disputed Chaco territory and withdrew her delegation from Washington, where negotiations with Bolivia were taking place. Paraguay then recaptured the fort and sent her delegation back again. Meani while Bolivia had ordered her delegation to leave Washington, charging Para- | guay with attacking a Bolivian fort on the Laguna Grand. Since then serious hostilities have occurred. Bolivia has pointed out to the League of Nations that during the past 50 years she has experienced, a steady economic growth and the need for a free access to the sea has become of increasing importance; the logical egress is the Paraguay River, and, she asserts, this is Bolivia's by right. COLOMBIANS BOUSED ANGER AGAINST PERU CITIZENS DEMAND WAR NEW YORK. Sept. 19 A message from Bogota, Colombia, states that tens of thousands of Colombians to-day clamoured for war with Peru and dipped into their pocket-books and jewel cases to provide funds to finance it. The Senate passed the second reading of a bill authorising the Government to arrange a credit of 10,000,000 dollars for national defence. This action followed a report of the seizure by Peruvian citizens of the Colombian port of Leticia, on the Amazon. Lcticia was ceded to Colombia in tho boundary treaty with Peru. • Although the Peruvian Government informed Colombia that, as far as it knew, no Peruvian soldiers were involved in the seizure, and that it was merely a regional affair, crowds filled the streets at Bogota and shouted for war, yelling: "Down with Sanchez Ccrro " (President of Peru).

I . I The territory, amounting to 100,000 square miles, in the north-east corner of the Amazon basin, has been long in dispute between Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil and Peru. The boundaries between Peru, Colombia and Brazil were, adjusted (subject to ratification) through the good offices of the United States Secretary of State in March, 1925. Colombia recognises Peru's title to certain disputed territory north of the Pulumayo River* and Peru admits Colombia's ownership of a strip of territory adjacent to the line between the confluence of the Apaports and Yapura Rivers, and the village of Tabatinga on the Amazon. Ecuador and Peru are on the south of Colombia. In 1928 about 13,000 square miles of the province of Putumayo, on the eastern flank of the Andes, - was ceded to Peru in an adjustment of boundaries, Colombia obtaining a clear title to land reaching to the. Amazon.