BRITISH YOUTH HELD BY SOVIET.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19240, 29 November 1930, Page 21 (Supplement)

BRITISH YOUTH HELD BY SOVIET.

PASSPORT STOLEN; WAS KEPT IN FILTHY ROOM. (Special to the “Star.”) LONDON, October 16. Anxiety is growing over the fate in Siberia of Mr Christopher Jowett, a relative of Mr F. W. Jowett, the Socialist M.P. ‘for Bradford East. Mr C. Jowett, who is eighteen, was stopped by the police on the RussoChinese frontier on September 25 while travelling by rail to Pekin to visit his parents, and was taken back to Chita under armed escort. It ir, alleged that his passport had been stolen. At Chita he was lodged in a filthy room for which he had to pay an exorbitant sum. There is no bedding in the room, and his food is of the scantiest. Not being a Boh shevist, he can only buy in the open market, where supplies are very expensive and of wretched quality. Mental Strain. His money is now said to be exhausted, and he is suffering severely from cold owing to a lack of suitable clothing. His friends fear that the mental strain of such treatment on a mere boy may have serious effects. The combined efforts of the ConsulGeneral at Harbin, Manchuria, the British Legation at Pekin, and the Embassy in Moscow have failed to secure the boy’s release, though normally such cases are settled within a week. It is understood that Mr F. W. Jowett was formerly active in working for the exclusion of Communists from the Socialist Party in Britain, and it! is suggested that this may be the cause of the Soviet Government’s action. Mr F. W. Jowett, M.P., said to a reporter in Bradford yesterday: “I know nothing about the circumstances connected with my young relative beyond what has appeared in the Press, but I hope to see other relatives within the next day or two, and will certainly do what I can to get inquiries made concerning him. He is a son of a cousin of mine who went to China thirty years ago as a Wesleyan missionary, but has now taken up a commercial career.”