GERMANISING THE BALKANS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXVI, Issue 10043, 11 January 1909, Page 1

GERMANISING THE BALKANS.

Sarajevo (Bosnia), jjtiv. 6.

We sat round a table in a Serb hotel : n Sarajevo, and talked' of the German peril. There was a- Dane who spoke of Slesvig, a Frenchman who spoke of Alsace-Lorraine, a German Pole whose land had been expropriated by the Germans, and Signer C'hiesa, an Italian deputy belonging to the Republican groun, who had come to Bosnia in order to collect material for denouncing in the Italian Chamber Signor Tittoni and the alliance with Austria. . There can be no doubt of the thoroughly rough and brutal methods by which the Germans have extended German influence and increased the German population in the provinces they have taken from Denmark) France, Poland, and Italy, and when Mr Alexander Ourukus, the editor of the "Serbsky Retch,'* and one of the ablest publicists of Bosnia, told in restrained and moderate language what the Germans are now doing in Bosnia I felt horrified for the moment by the prospect that lies before us if Europe does not erect a barrier of some kind against the Teutonic inundation which is pouring towards Salonica and Constantinople. In the Serbs, with their racial and religiQUs solidarity, their martial qualities and thedifficult nature of the country they inhabit, Europe has ready to her hand ail the material for a magnificent barrier. During the last twenty years 100,000 German® have settled in Croatia-, German villages are now to be found as far south as Salonica., and the emigration of the Slavs from Herzegovina, is so great that the country will soon be parcelled out among German settlers. Even ,on .the extreme southern point of Bosnia the sigiis of Germanisation are evident. On, the brow of the great mountain which, constitutes the frontier of Kbvi-Baza-r are three gigantic.. tetters, the initials of the words "Francis Joseph, Imperator," and at the frontier town of Übatz all the signs and inscriptions on public buildings are in German. Vienna, does not confine herself, however, to tracing letters 20ft long on the brow of a, mountain. She has set herself with great skill and perseverance to crush the Serbs of Bosnia, and to make that province German. Let us consider, in the first place, how she is dealing with the Serb Press. The Press is one of the greatest obstacles to the Germanising of Bosnia; therefore, itis being treated far worse than in any other country in the world, not excepting Russia. After the Young Turk movement succeeded in Constantinople, the editor of the Serbsky Retell of Sarajevo remarked that "Now Bosnia is the only country in Europe that 'has not got a constitution." For this offenoe the editor j was kept in prison for four months without trial. There is no .special Press law, any more than in Russia, but, as in Russia, the police are able to do what they like with the Press.

I visited a Serb newspaper office here the other day, and found that the only foreign papers in the office are the Neue Freie Presse, of Vienna, and the Pesther Lloyd, of Budapest, both of them semiofficial Austro-Hufigarian papers. _ Every other 1 foreign paper to' Which this Serb journal subscribes is seized in the post, and if tie editors manage to get French or English papers surreptitiously and translate from them 'anything bearing on the Bosnian question they are confiscated and fined'. Not a single Servian paper is allowed to enter the country, and! the late Count Kallay even prohibited the importation and sale of a somewhat impartial book Which ha himself had written about Servia. Nor is it always safe to translate articles even from tie Neue Freie Presse. Some months ago the Serbsky Retch translated: from that paper an article in which the question of granting autonomy to Bosnia was discussed in an academic manner, and for this offence the editor was sent to prison, and is in prison still.

When a paper is confiscated it is not only the editor who -is punished, but the publisher, printer, office boys, newsboys, business agent, and advertising manager. Ai short time ago a paper in Banaluki published an article entitled "The Powder is Ready," saying that in case of an Austro-Servian war the Bosnians would help the Servians. For this about a dozen different people were 1 sentenced to terms of imprisonment, ranging from two years to mine years. In Bosnia there is a state of siege real but not formal, in Herzegovina the' state of siege is both real and formal. Coming to Mbstar last night I was prohibited from entering the town•until I had: shown my passport, which was temporarily taken* from me. In the town, itself I saw more soldiers than inhabitants. Official proclamations posted up in the hotels call attention to the danger of taking photographs near fortified places. The railways all., around are strongly by troops', and in some villages near- the Montenegrin frontier there are exactly as many soldiers >as there are inhabitants (in> Trebinya, if or instance, there are 2000 soldiers and 2000 'inhabitants). -J.

In short, it is clear that if ever there was a country, held down.; by ' foreign bayonets against the will of 99 per cent, of "the population, that country! is BosniaHerzegovina. Even if Aiustria had benefited the! people much, more than she has done, there would be no excuse for her presence here any longer. Even/ if : Servia's record was blacker than it is, there would be siq >good reasoni to make that a pretext for refusing autonomy to the kindred peo.ple of Bosnia. But "the arijument which will best'appeal to Enror* is this—unless you get Austria to leavo will ;' break out in the Balkans within' six | months, tamd there is nto knowing how i wide an area it may embrace.