AMERICA AND RUSSIA.

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXV, Issue 5009, 6 July 1903, Page 5

AMERICA AND RUSSIA.

THE PETITION AGAINST PERSECUTION OF JEWS. WASHINGTON, July, 3. _ President Roosevelt, in what is practically an official announcement, states that he is determined to forward the Hebrew petition in favour of their coreligionists in Russia to the Czar. The situation is delicate, but it is unofficially seated at Washington that Mr J. W. Riddle, American Charge d’Afi faires at St. Petersburg, will discover if the petition has been reoeived. If the answer is in the negative, the matter will end. [According to previous cable messages, the Czar had intimated that if the petition was presented he would return it, on tho ground that Russia’s policy is to refrain from interference in tho internal affairs of other nations, and that sho insists on similar treatment at their hands.]

THE PRESIDENT’S RETORT TO - M. CASSINI. (Received July 5, 5.24 p.m.) WASHINGTON, July 4. : Tho inspired statement by President Roosevelt concerning tho American petition in favour of the Jews to the Czar, which was issued to the press, is in the nature of a reply to inspired statements made to the press by M. Cassini, Russian Ambassador, at Washington. In those communications M. Cassini said that Russia would not tolerate interference in connection with tho Kishinefl affair, which was purely one of internal concern. On this President Roosevelt remarks that “it is strange Russia should chooso this particular moment to make semi-official communications to the American people, when by methods certainly the reverse of friendly to the United States she sought to make China join in breaking her plighted faith to all tho Powers regarding an open-door in Manchuria, and endeavoured to bar American access to trade in Manchuria.”