VICTORY FOR CANTONESE

Taranaki Daily News, 18 December 1929, Page 9

VICTORY FOR CANTONESE

REBEL INVADERS RETREAT > ' ... /'/ TWO MISSIONERS ABDUCTED —- - x ■ I HELD FOR HEAVY RANSOM . ■ ■ .■ ■ ■ ... Shanghai, Dec, 16. Reliable reports from Canton show, that,; the Cantonese victory over the rebels has . not been exaggerated. The • invaders are J still retreating helter-skelter. A disciplined gang of Communists in; -f vaded Tayeh, a town .fifty miles south- i east of Hankow, and abducted the Revs, - H. Sandy and E. Livesey, Methodist mis*i?-. sionaries, holding them for heavy ransom J, It is a strange fact that the town was not A looted. Chances of a repetition of the 1917 in-,, cidents occurring in Shanghai appear: to, * be negligible. The latest stocktaking oiW the sitiiati;|i reveals that prompt measures A taken by the Chinese military authorities ;' prevented the Communistic outbreaks from assuming serious proportions.

PROTECTION OF FOREIGNERS; ~- NAVAL AND MILITARY FORCES. British Wireless. _ Rugby, Dec. 16. Mr. Arthur Henderson (foreign Secre- . tary) stated that so far as his information went the forces opposed to the Nanking A Government in China had been i‘defeated's near Canton, and. had made no ’Urthcr / progress on any of the other main lines’/' of attack’. The situation at Nanking and J Shanghai appeared to be quiet. ; The naval forces available for the pro-./ tectionof British nationals in case of danger were five cruisers, one aircraft eight, destoyers, five sloops and eighteen / gunboats. The available military forces consisted of three battalions at Hong Kong, / two in Shanghai and two at Tientsin, with / small detachments at Peking and Weihai?. wei, The other foreign Powers had an aggregate naval strength in Chinese waters which was approximately the same, and' about 8000 troops, mainly, at, Tientsin and Shanghai.