CONTRABAND NET

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24255, 25 March 1940, Page 7

CONTRABAND NET

CLOSING MORE TIGHTLY MAGNITUDE OF TASK SOWS WAR PURCHASES BRITAIN WATCHING POSITION (British Official Wireless) (United Press Association) (By Electric Telegraph—Copyright) . ' RUGBY, Mar. 23. (Received Mar. 24, at 8 p.m.) The work of the. British naval units in the Mediterranean in applying contraband control means arduous duties for British patrols. In one patrol area of the Mediterranean alone, His Majesty’s, ships had “spoken”. 698 vessels between the beginning of 1940 and the end of February. Of these 410 were communicated with by signal hut not boarded, and, out of 288 boarded, only a small proportion were diverted to the contraband control base, ... y.,.r ■ ' Every effort is made to ensure the quiet and smooth working of; the

Allied contraband control, and the “navicert” system is being taken advantage of to a growing extent. The Minister of Economic Warfare (Mr R, H. Cross), was asked in the House of Commons what information he: had regarding the increased; traffic in army oil and other war materials from the United States ip Russia, via Vladivbstock, and what steps he was taking to ensure that none of, this war material was passed bn to Germany. Mr Gross replied that he understood that the Soviet purchases of oil in the United States during the year ended March 1, although much above the 1938 figures, were not in excess of the; quantities imported in some previous years. There was, however, evidence of large Soviet purchases from the United States of, other war, materials,, especially copper, and this question was receiving, the constant attention of the British Government.

EFFECTIVE BLOCKADE EFFORTS AT EVASION USE OF AMERICAN MAILS ALERT CONTROL OFFICERS From many sources evidence is, accumulating of the alertness' of the British contraband control officers. Some of the stories told of German efforts to beat the. economic blockade would proyide excellent material for detective thrillers. The British task is obviously huge. It may be impossible to track down every device of the Nazis, but all the time the net is closing more tightly,, and recent reports supply further proof of the; effectiveness of the British control. When the British authorities first decided to investigate United States mail, a strong protest was lodged, but Britain was quickly able to prove that negotiable securities, jewellery, food, clothing and many other valuable articles were b&ing forwarded to the ReiCh. American journalists in London were recently invited to inspect some of the devices Germany was using to evade the British blockade as proof of the fact that Britain was not breaking- the seals of United States mailbags, merely out of some arbitrary desire to enforce an airtight blockade. In a room in London University the evidence was set before the journalists. An official of the Ministry of Economic Warfare explained that during November. December and January, 5,279,750 marks, 9000 dollars in cash, £17,800 sterling and “ small sums ” in Argentine pesos, Swedish kroner, Czechoslovak crowns, French, Belgian and Swiss francs and other currencies had been found passing to Germany. Smuggling food out of America under many ingenious devices was now “ organised on a tremendous scale,” the official said. In three months about 25,000 , packages had been examined and about 17,000 had contained contraband. The figures for a single month showed, he said, that of 4462 parcels examined, 4063 contained contraband. It was also found that the packages seized contained false Customs declarations. One package, for example, containing two cans of coffee, a package of lentils and other canned goods, was labelled “samples, stained-glass windows.”