SOVIET RUSSIA

Otago Witness, Issue 3615, 26 June 1923, Page 31

SOVIET RUSSIA

RECOGNITION TO BE URGED. LONDON, June 17. the Daily Telegraph states that the Soviet Government intends to approach the British Government with a suggestion that now that all outstanding questions have been satisfactorily settled the moment is opportune for a general settlement between the two countries, especially on the question of the full recognition of the present regime in Russia. RUSSIAN CROWN JEWELS. LONDON, June 18. 1 he Daily Telegraph’s Berlin correspondent states that Herr Krestinski, the Bolshevist Ambassador in Berlin, has a safe in his Embassy in the ‘Cuter den Linden containing 30ib weight of diamonds of large size and the finest water, which have been brought from Russia since the beginning. of the year bv diplomatic couriers. He is charged with the task of selling the diamonds, which are now being classified and valued. Some of the jewels are of extraordinary size and undoubtedly belonged to the murdered Imperial Family. An American is in treaty for the gems, but the very heavy United States import duty is a bar, though Bolshevist agents are organising a scheme to smuggle some of the gems into the United States by way of Canada. There are ten times as many jewels still remaining in Moscow, where a special guard watches the diamonds in the Kremlin, as the treasure forms an easily transportable reserve, which will be available in the event of the Bolshevist leaders ha -- ing to fly hurriedly. This enormous concentration of diamonds alarms the professional dealers, who say that it will take the market 10 years to absorb such a quantity of big gems. The leading dealers, therefore, are trying to organise a world-wide boycott against the Bolshevists’ diamond dealers. The Times’s Berlin correspondent reports that strange stories of a mysterious fund of diamonds, worth a fabulous sum, held in reserve in case of a sudden Soviet collapse and flight of the leaders, have been current in Russian circles. It is said that diamonds weighing more than 101 b are stored in Moscow, at the Kremlin, though the exact location is changed from time to time, and is known only to members of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party. A Berlin newspaper now gives some details of the fund. It declares that at regular intervals couriers, carrying travelling bags bearing the seals of the Commissary for Foreign Affairs, arrive at the Berlin Bolshevist headquarters, where the contents of the bags are transferred to a large safe. Recently several German jewellers were invited to sort and weigh the stones, with the result that it became known that a gi-eat weight of diamonds is kept in a hiding place, the weight exceeding 301 b. Many stones of great beauty have been recognised as belonging to the Russian Imperial Family. M. Krestinsky has been entrusted with the disposal of the jewels, and has established agencies in New York, Paris, London, and other cenrtes. AMERICAN SCHOONERS SEIZED. NEW YORK, June 19. A missionary who has returned from the Diomede Islands, in Behring Straits, reports that the Soviet authorities have seized three United States trading schooners on charges of violating the Russian laws. The Soviet is most strictly enforcing the law in Siberian waters against all countries. CORE KSPONDENCE CLOSED. LONDON, June 19. The Daily Express’s Moscow correspondent reports that M. Tchitcherin has despatched a Note to Lord Curzon accepting the British Note and closing the correspondence. RECOGNITION OF SOVIET. TOKIO, June 21. Count U chi da (Minister of Foreign Affairs) has issued a statement that Japan will not grant recognition to the Russian Soviet Government unless Russia settles for the massacre of the Japanese in Nikolaievsk and recognises the debts incurred under the Czar's regime.

MOSCOW CABMAN'S CRIMES. MOSCOW’, June 18. The police have been baffled for some time by a number of dead men wrapped in sacks found in out-of-the-way places in the city. Finally they arrested a cab driver named Kamaroff, a man of kindly appearance, who confessed he had killed oo men and one woman, mainly c:i the grounds that he hated life, and regarded all men as deceivers, who ought to be destroyed. Kamaroff lured his victims to his premises, offering horses for sale, j ’I hen he stunned them with a hammer and strangled them. A PARDON REJECTED. LONDON, June 22. Tlic Daily Mail’s Berlin correspondent reports that the daughter of General | Brusiioff (Red army commander, arid i formerly the Czar's Commander-in-Chief) | was executed bv the Bolshevists at Mcsj cow for concealing sacred vessels to pre- ! vent them from falling into the hands of I the Bolshevists. She was informed that | in view of her father's services a petition ! for her pardon would he favourably con- ! sidered. She replied: “ I cannot accept \ a pardon from the bloody hands of the | executioners of the Russian people.” SI:*: was therefore shot.