OUT OF CONTROL

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 89, Issue 277, 23 November 1945, Page 5

OUT OF CONTROL

SITUATION IN JAVA INDONESIAN CABINET’S STORMY PASSAGE Recd. 7 p.m. Batavia, Nov. 21. Java, at present, seems out of control, certainly out of control of the new Indonesian Cabinet, which is having a stormy passage early in its career. It lost its Minister for Social Affairs, Dr. Adjidarmo, before he had even taken office. He telegraphed that he has too many worries of his own in Banjoewangi (East Java) to accept a place in the Cabinet. A disturbing Indonesian broadcast from the Governor of East Java, which might be either a threat or a warning, was information that if British forces continued to kill large numbers of Indonesians, he could not remain responsible for the safety of the R.A.P.W.I. in his area.

A report from Ambarawa (middle Java) states that Indonesians have burnt the R.A.P.W.I. camp there. There is no indication whether there has been loss of life, but a Gurkha battalion which had been helping to extricate the R.A.P.W.I. from Magelang forced marched to Ambarawa and early to-day two companies of Indian troops were flown to Semarang from Sourabaya. INDONESIAN CASUALTIES

British sources estimate the Indonesian casualties in Sourabaya since the battle began at about 6000. Sjaiifuddin announced that Dr. Mohammad Roem, chairman of the Indonesian national committee and a member of the joint British-Indonesian contact bureau. was shot and baulv wounded by an Ambonese squad while sitting in his house this afternoon. Earlier, Roem had conferred with Brigadier King, the British force commander in Batavia on the preservation of law and order in Batavia. Allied headquarters explained that the Ambonese withdrawing from Batavia, with their families, would evacuate Java altogether.