FOOD FOR NAZI-OCCUPIED TERRITORY

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 84, Issue 190, 14 August 1940, Page 6

FOOD FOR NAZI-OCCUPIED TERRITORY

SUGGESTED LIFTING OF BRITISH BLOCKADE PROBLEM OF FAIR DISTRIBUTION. ( British Official Wireless.] RUGBY, Aug. 12. There is no news of the receipt by the British Government of a request which has been fully reported in British newspapers from the European food distributing commission to raise the blockade to supply food to the Netherlands, Belgium, Poland, and Norway, where, according to New York reports, the commission says “18,000,000 persons are facing starvation.”

It is expected, however, that such a request will be forthcoming and it will be given a considered reply. z Meanwhile it is pointed out in wellinformed quarters that the German

Government is continually reiterating that Germany has instituted an efficient blockade against Britain, that the British blockade against Germany is ineffective, and that the food situa* tion in Germany is excellent. Indeed, the Economic Minister, Dr. Walther Funk, in the latest of many official pronouncements on this subject is reported to have said at the opening of the Kosinberg Fair that “a food scarcity in Germany is now impossible.” In view of these allegations, insisted upon as facts by the Nazi leaders, informed quarters in London express the opinion that the problem would seem really to be one of fair distribution of existing and future supplies. In these circumstances it is difficult to see what help could be given by raising a blockade which the German Government to be virtually inoperative.