BRITAIN INVESTIGATING

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26176, 12 June 1946, Page 5

BRITAIN INVESTIGATING

ESCAPE FROM FRANCE

LONDON, June 10. The British. Government is investigating the circumstances under which the Grand Mufti left France, said a Foreign Oifice spokesman. The French Government is stated to be aware of Britain’s wish that the Mufti should not return to the Middle East. The British Legation at Damascus denied that the Mufti had landed in a British plane. A spokesman said that no British plane of any description arrived at Damascus on Saturday or Sunday with the exception of the British Overseas Aircraft Corporation’s •plane linking Bagdad and Cairo. The Syrian authorities ordered security officials to scrutinise travellers' documents more closely, says the Damascus correspondent of the Associated Press. It is considered likely that the Mufti will appear somewhere near Bludan village, close to Damascus, where 30 delegates of the Arab League Council are discussing Palestine. The Mufti’s escape from Paris caused a political flurry ip Syria. There is no confirmation of the report that the Mufti had reached Damascus. Reuter’s Paris correspondent reports that British Embassy officials called at the French Foreign Office and officially asked for an explanation about the Mufti’s reported departure from France. The French were unable to offer a definite explanation, and stated that an inquiry was in progress. The current theory is that the Mufti left France in the guise of a member of one of the Arab missions travelling between Paris and the Middle East. The Mufti was recently ill or feigned illness, and may have taken the opportunity to shave off his beard. The Pans newspaper Le Monde, which often reflects Foreign Office opinion, reports that the Mufti left France among the entourage of King Feisal of Iraq, who travelled from Calasi to England in a British destroyer. The Mufti is ■ reported to have left England by plane. The Le Monde says neither the British nor the French really wanted to prevent the Mufti from leaving France. It adds that the area in which the Mufti lived, the Forest of Marly, was a “ veritable British camp, with observation towers and barracks.’’ Reuter’s correspondent at Bludan (near Damascus) says it is reliably reported that the Mufti was expected in Damascus for some time. A house had been made ready for him. The Syrian Government officially has no knowledge of the Mufti’s arrival. The passenger list of the only British aircraft which landed at Damascus to-day was scrutinised and showed only bona fide travellers.