SOVIET RUSSIA.

Wairarapa Daily Times, 10 September 1924, Page 5

SOVIET RUSSIA.

HOW IT IS GOVERNED. THE TIBET OF EUROPE. Association—Electric Telegraph— Copyrigli. LONDON, Monday. The Daily Chronicle has commenced publication of a series of dispatches from its special correspondent in Russia who spent months in mixing with all classes. He tells how a handful of determined men hold 140 millions in fear and subjection. • ■ Russia is the Tibet of Europe. All Russians are strangely sensitive. ‘We are not civilised,' they keep on saying. The worst period was in 1920-21, when a complete stoppage was threatened There was no regular water supply, and hardly any sanitation. The free ration of State consisted of worm-eaten herrings and portions of bread, doled out to last a month.

‘‘ Things are much better now, though Moscow is still the most expensive place in the world for the foreigner. Hot baths cost 7s. The hotels are fairly clean and comfortable, but are run very inefficiently, as the managers are Communists, chosen for their party loyalty. - “Everybody wants to live in Moscow. Few remain in the provinces except from sheer necessity. There were 2} millions in Moscow before the war, and tho population has since increased enormously. The overcrowding is appalling; five or more people are frequently herded in one room. “Tho shop windows are full of brightly coloured caricatures of religious things. They are revolting to the religious man, but the artistic quality is not lacking in these blasphemous productions. The State is all-powerful everywhere. Moscow resembles London during the war. All the hotels and the big blocks of buildings have been taken, by Government departments. It is a city of bureaucrats.” —Aus. and N.Z. Cable Assn.