DEPORTED POLES

New Zealand Herald, Volume 79, Issue 24202, 18 February 1942, Page 6

DEPORTED POLES

DISTRESS IN v RUSSIA ARRANGEMENTS, FOR RELIEF [BY TELEGRAPH —PRESS ASSOCIATION] WELLINGTON. Tuesday The following cabled advice from London has been received by the Polish Con,nil-General at Wellington: "M. Sikorski's interview with M. Stalin in Moscow resulted in M. Stalin promising to transfer more than 1,000,000 previously deported Polish women, children and aged disabled military men from every part of European or Asiatic Russia to the South-eastern provinces of Russia on the Afghanistan and Iran frontiers. These people, who until now have lacked essential necessities of life, will bo provided, so far as is possible, with clothing and food. "The collection of these distressed people in this particular part of Russia alongside an allied country will enable them to receive assistance, through Iran, of the Polish Government, whose modest means have already been put at their disposal, as well as help already sent by the allied nations. "Large contributions sent by the American authorities and also by Poles residing in both the Americas have already arrived and have been* distributed under the supervision of the Polish Ambassador to Russia. Moreover, Mr. W. C. Bullitt, the special envov of President Rooseveltafco the Middle East, has agreed to M.fllfeorski's request to hand over through Iran a large amount of American supplies stored in the Middle East. "The British Government, in addition to the British Red Cross Society's generous contribution, already despatched to Russia, has arranged facilities for conveying 500 Polish children from Russia to India for the duration of the war."