GATHERING CLOUDS

Otago Witness, Issue 3882, 7 August 1928, Page 32

GATHERING CLOUDS

UNREST IN JUGOSLAVIA. RIVAL PARLIAMENTS MEET. BELGRADE, August 2. While Parliament was sitting here under the new Premier (M. Koroshetz) a rival Parliament composed of 90 members of the Corat and other deputies met at Zagreb and virtually declared war against Belgrade. They adopted a resolution that its measures in future would «not be observed outside Serbia proper. DEMAND BY CROATIA. COMPLETE SEPARATION. LONDON, August 2. The subject races of Jugo-Slavia, in the centre of Europe’s political powder magazine, are demanding independence, and a rival Parliament has been established.

The Jugo-Slav national Parliament, or the bloodstained Skupshtina, representing..a medle., race of Croats, Slovenes and Serbs from Croatia, Slavonia, Albania, Austria, Bosnia, Herzegovina, and southern Hungary, in addition to Montenegro and Serbia, met at Belgrade for the first time since two Croatian deputies were shot dead and others wounded on July 20. The Croats refused to attend and held tlieir own Parliament, or Sabor, in Zagreb, their old capital, while the Serb Agrarians were also absent in sympathy with the Croats. Thus the Opposition benches were empty, while excited crowds paraded Zagreb’s beflagged streets calling for autonomy and waving banners bearing the words “ Zagreb’s Crotian-Serbs cannot be governed from Belgrade.” Their repreesntatives in the Sabor carried a demand for complete separation of Crotia from Jugo-Slavia, and they resolved to pay no more taxes, and called on the other provinces to join the struggle against Serb supremacy. Furthermore, they declared that the kingdoms of Crotia and Montenegro, in merging themselves with the kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes did not reckon, to lose their national individuality, but that Serbia had abused the constitution in order to establish hegemony over the rest.

The half empty Skupshtina sitting in an atmosphere jpf deep depression, received the Zagreb manifesto with indignation. All Serbs bitterly resented the manifesto’s reference to Montenegro and the Croats call to other provinces. The Vienna corespondent of the Daily Mail says that the Sabor, which was presided over by Al. Prebichevitch, decided to seek an alteration of the South Slavian regime by every legal means, declaring that the’“crimes of July 20, which were an organised attempt ’to destroy the opposition, make our attendance at the Skupshtina impossible, therefore we recommend the non-payment of taxes, and the Government of Crotia from Belgrade is no longer recognised.” This, in the opinion of some correspondents, means a revolution in South Slavia, and it is understood to be evident that the Jugoslavian Prime Minister, Father Korosec, a Slovene cleric who was formerly an autonomist and opposed a united South Slavia, cannot permanently control the non-Catholic members of the Cabinet. Eighty-three peasant Democrat deputies, three Slovenes, and two Montenegrins attended the Zagreb gathering under the red, -white and blue Croatian flag, and it is understod that their manifesto has the approval of AL Raditch, who is expected to preside over the Sabor as soon as he is veil enough. A Zagreb official bulletin states that the peasants’ coalition and the Belgrade Government are anxious to avoid°civil war and have ordered the military leadei s to show .the greatest forbearance.

RESPECT FOR CONSTITUTION. BELGRADE, August 3. The Premier (Father Korosec), in the Skupshtina, appealed to the recalcitrants to return. He declared that the Government was prepared to .enforce respect foi the Constitution. The assassination of the deputies was the personal act of a single man.

A clash of ideas ought logically to become a clash or arms in the opinion of observers here, but logical contradiction is the rule in the Balkans and consistency the exception, as illustrated by Al. Raditeh, who went to prison shouting “ Vive Republic! ” and returned shouting, “ \ ive King, Country, and Calm.”

A VIOLENT SPEECH. ZAGREB, August 3. The' Vice-president of the Crotian Peasants Party in a violently provocative speech, accused the Premier (Father Korosec) of advising the Slovenes in 1924 to allow themselves to be annexed by Italy,, and then, with the Vatican’s help, eventually to secure local autonomy.