Ce can be leased “for commercial ag- Big business’ stake in litaly By PETER MORTON A MERICAN big business has a *” ‘dollars-and-cents stake in the outcome of the April 18 Italian elections. Since 1943 about $300 million has been added to already > well established U.S. investments in Italy. General Electric is develop- ing the Aosta valley's water sup- ply. Standard Oil of New Jersey is drilling in Sicilian oil fields. Trans-World Airlines controls 40 percent of Italy’s air transport system. DuPont, Ford, Otis Elevator, American Export Lines, Alumin- um Company of America, Ameri- can Radiator, Worthington Pump, Westinghouse Air Brake and Western Electric are among other U.S. corporations with large vest- ed interests in Italy. Last spring, when top Italian trade negotiator Ivan Matteo Lombardo was in the U.S., he un- blushingly explained why Ameri- can corporations would find Italy a profitable investment. The New York Herald Tribune, March 31, 1947, reported his views. “An other argument on which he (Lombardo) will base his appeal to American capital is the profit to be derived from investments because of low wages paid in Italy.” The U.S. big business position “was consolidated under the terms of a recently negotiated treaty al- lowing private corporations to op- erate in Italy with the same rights and privileges as Italian enter- prises. This “open door” policy clears the way for complete U.S. economic domination because war- devastated Italian industry is in no position to compete with giant American corporations. Under an early agreement on August 14, 1947, the U.S. govern- MARCH Intervention in Italy Before the war prominent members of the Sons of*Italy in eames were closely identified with distribution of Mussolini’s Fascist propaganda in this’ country and linked with Italian Fascist organizations like the notorious Circola Roma in Van- couver. Now the order is.:participating in the American-spon- sored campaign to influence the outcome of this month’s elections in Italy. Here, Gustavo .d’Errico, general secretary of the | agg Selly = inspects one of the thousands of circulars sent to Italian-Canadians in Montreal urging them to work for defeat of the Socialist-Communist front by writing letters to their relatives in Italy. Actions‘ | louder than words, however, Vt pee - Gasperi government. a ine ferry ment cancelled an estimated $900 million debt owed by the Italian government. The agreement laid the groundwork for American in- dustry to reap far more than that in profits. Part of the August 14 treaty reached back to the days of Mus- solinii when Morgan & Co., the Chase National Bank (Rockefel- ler-controlied) and Dillon Read (Sec. of Defense James V. Forres- tal’s Wall Street home) floated a $94 million bond issue that was swiftly grabbed by American in- vestors. In 1940, Italy stopped paying interest. After Pearl Harbor Day the bonds could have been pur- chased for 5c or 10c on the dol- lar. Under the August 14 pact the Italian government agreed to honor the Mussolini obligation and pay accrued interest. This means a windfall of $136.4 million for the bondholders. “As described in official U. S. circles, the Italian decision to pay off the face amount of its prewar government bonds,” said the June 13, 1947 New York Times, “was offered as first lien on the Italian economy.” The Ital- ian left-wing and labor movement bitterly assailed the Aug. 14 agreement as a Plan to reduce their country “to the status of an economic satellite of America.” Italy's economic plight is ad- mittedly desperate. Hard hit dur- ing the war ,she lost 30 percent of her electric power plants, 50 percent of her locomotives, 85. pereent of her merchant marine. Today 46 million people are pro- ducing about 60 percent as much as 44 million did ten years ago. More than two million people are unemployed. For recovery Italy needs coal. Before the war she was the Ruhr valley’s best customer. But today U.S, coal companies control the Italian market. Fortune maga- zine, August, 1947, reported sales at $22 or $24 a ton “of which $14 goes to shipowners who have been taking advantage of the shipping shortage.” If Italy con- tinues to buy U.S. coal, the ar- ticle pointed, it will cost her $100 million more than would Euro- pean coal. The Italian left attributes Ita- iy's hardships to the failure of profit-minded foreign and domes- tic monopolists to develop the country’s resources and industries for the people’s benefit. A left victory in Italy would méan an extensive nationalization prog- ram, vigorous land reforms and abolition of monopoly control by private interests. At almost any, cost American corporations seek to avoid these sweeping changes that would end their control of Italy’s industry. Czechs rebuff Labor critics CRITICISM by the British La- bor Party of the new Czech- oslovak government has been rejected by the Czechoslovak Social Democratic Party. “The Czechoslovak Social Demo- cratic Party cannot agree. with your attitude toward the Febru- ary events and the present state of affairs in this country,” the statement replying to the Brit- ish Labor Party said. “As we all found out, it was a matter of suppressing an at- U. S. calls ‘het —LONDON. A report that the British loy- alty purge was initiated by the U.S. has been published by the conservative Daily Express here. According to the newspaper, the U.S. government threaten- ed to stop sending information on arms research to Britain un- less all those suspected of Com- munist sympathies were weed- ed out of the British Joint Ser- vices. The report said that Sir Alwyn Crow, chief of the Brit- ish Joint Services Mission in Washington, transmitted this message to London. ' The loyalty probe has been denounced by civil service union leaders and civil liberties groups. Members of parliament, who have no control over the secret probe, have pointed out that the opportunity is granted to any malicious informer with a grievance against a colleague to obtain his removal. Americans exploit Pacific islanders ‘TH U.S. navy, which © took South Pacific islands under American trusteeship, is now sell- ing the natives’ farmland to Am- erican business groups that: will exploit them for profit. The navy has imposed wage ceilings of 5c to 7c an hour for farm labor there and 9c to 11%c an hour for skilled labor. These facts were revealed by the Institute of Ethnic Affairs, American group working for the welfare of colonial peoples. They were documented by a notice is- sued by the Deputy High Com-- _ missioner of the Pacific Islands. The notice, printed in the navy newspaper, Saipanorama, states that large parts of Tinian’ island riculture.” Bids are invited from residents of the islands, the con- tinental U.S. or any U.S. posses- sion. Island inhabitants, all of whom are poor, will not be able to qual- ify, however, because the notice states that “only proposals con- templating large-scale commer- cial agriculture are desired.” The Institute said that if is- land natives refuse to work for the miserable wages offered, “labor from outside the Trust ter- ritory will be imported.’ By im- porting former enemy nationals, such as Japanese and Okinawans, the navy can force acceptance of whatever pay it chooses. The Institute charged that the navy’s action is “a violation of the Charter of the United Na- tions,” which provides that “the nationals in Trust territories only in cases where security is invol- ved.” interests of the inhabitants of the Trust territory shall be para- mount’ in any economic activity undertaken there. Furthermore, it said, by limit- ing foreign bids to Americans the navy violates a U.S. pledge to the UN Security Council that “prefer- ence shall be given to American SURES: anrerIerer yee All Forms Of Insurance LAURIE NOWRY MA, 7756 706 Holden Bldg. MA. 9407 (after 5) tempt of reaction from abroad, of government work and the progress toward socialism. “It used all means at its dis- posal—beginning with sabotage which tried to stop our further resignation of ministers, and ending with an anti-government conspiracy and high treason, “The whole Czechoslovak peo- ple and the Social Democratic Party and its ranks stood up against such attempts. “If you speak of an attack from without and treason from within, it is true that those fac- tors existed here. “But they were on the other side, not as might appear from your statement, and the Czecho- slovak people did not succumb to them.” Those who spoke of Social De- mocratic principles’ expressed sharper criticism of the recent events in Czechoslovakia than of fascist dictatorships in Spain, Portugal and Greece, added the statement. “The view that a minority forced a dictatorship upon the nation does not conform * with reality,” the statement goes: on. “As a result of the February events the government was re- constructed according to parlia- mentary usages and with the participation of President Benes. — “The head of the state, the president, not only through his constitutional position, but also ‘through his moral authority and Philosophic leadership, persono- fies the democratic methods and basis of the Czechoslovak re- MAIL ORDERS PREPAID SHH WEARING A HAT won’t + mnie you a success but it will dress you up. STETSON HATS CREAN HATS The only Canadian-made union hat 4s EAST HASTINGS = Replying to a delegation of workers from factories in Pra- gue, Kladno and Pizen, during the February crisis, Benes stat- ed: “I should say that a govern ment without the Communists does not exist for me. I speak clearly, openly and deliberately. I must guide the government in such a way that nobody could conceive the idea that we can cust the biggest parliamentary ‘ majority. ANAT AT Poor advice. —LONDON. AZI officers with experience in fighting on the Russian front are now advising the British army, War Minister Emanuel Shinwell has disclosed. Shinwell made the admission when a Labor member of par liament asked for,an explana~ tion of an appeal broadcast over the radio at a German officers’ prisoner-of-war camp in North- umberland in the north of Ens- land. The appeal asked for “offi- cers and armorers with techni- cal experience of weapons and motorized vehicles in winter campaigns in the east” to act as advisers in winter exercises Slinwell said he was not aware that the use of war prisoners in this manner contravened in- ternational law, adding: any rate, we’re doing it.” mei SALLY BOWES Let Me Solve Your INCOME TAX PROBLEMS Room 20 — 9 East Hastings $7.50 to $10 $5.50 to $9 ‘