_ by the

‘

The Toronto Daily Star played it up big.

Who plotted what?

The false story used

TORONTO
Two months ago, on October
28—at the height of the Geneva
foreign ministers’ conference —
the Toronto Daily Star head-
a sensational “spy-plot” re
Port, purported to have involved
the Czechoslovak legation in Ot-
tawa. In the fantastic’ story it
Splashed over its front. pages, a
Certain Jiri Stembera, a Czech
Mmmigrant, duped two Czecho-
Slovak diplomats into believing
€ was a “Communist.” The
diplomats thereupon entrusted
M with a “highly secret” mis-
Sn of spying against other
hoslovak Canadians here.
ee whole cloak-and-dagger story
8s rounded out with secret ren-
d zvous, code names and confi:
€ntial documents.
b The “sensation” was picked up
~~ other newspapers and radio
tions across the country. Tory

: PRAGUE
Jiri Stembera, a reporter on
ai Canadian emigre paper Nase
saad (Our Voices) in Canada,
ie ated the Czechoslovak lega-
On in Ottawa where he present-
ed himself under the assumed
eee of Jina as an emigre seek-
"8 to return home under the
amnesty, and at the same time

ffered to give information about

be
d

terror,

ovalks prominent in the
actionary emigre movement.

Shen Czechoslovak authorities

~ Course rejected the offer. Un-

daunted, Stembera returned to
‘: ewriter. A sensation had
Ks N ordered, and he would pro-
ce one. -

ae next day, Friday, October
Rea ae Toronto Daily Star ap-
teh With an eye-catching an-
Batol cot advertising the sen-
al revelations of Jiri Stem-
offi apnom Czechoslovak legation
“cials in Ottawa had allegedly
1°) persuade to. undertake
ie nis for Czechoslovakia. In
rea hag whet the appetites of
BS & ase Star presented him
militant fighter against com-

mand a victim of Red

€spion;

“Bae will tell how he duped

; father,

ie c €ch diplomats into believ-

isn’, — “8S a Communist. He
the Reds executed his

illed his mother, and

Toronto Star

chief George Drew quickly de-

manded an “investigation.” But

after two days, the whole story
dropped mysteriously out
sight. The “series of articles”
promised never materialized.
Why? Here’s the answer: ;

Stembera, according to the
hoax-story in the Star, told of
his mother and father having
been executed by the “Reds”
and of himself having spent 13
months in a Czechoslovak jail.

But investigation by Prague
newspapers reveals that no one
was more surprised to hear this

piece of news than Stembera’s

mother, who lives in the Kosire
section of Prague. She was. visit-
ed by a Czech reporter a few
weeks ago.

Here is the true story about

Stembera and his “spy-plot,” as

it appeared in the November 26
issue of Prague News Letter,
published in Prague.

.»..and the true story.

kept him in prison for 13 months.
He has fought communism since
he was 22.”

No one was more surprised
to hear this piece of news than
Jiri Stembera’s mother, now liv-
ing on ‘a government pension in
the Kosire section of Prague,
when she was informed of it by
a reporter from the Prague trade
paper Prace. He visited her at
her home and found her in good
health and taking care of her
niece’s two children while their
mother was at work. It is well
known in the neighborhood that
Stembera died of cancer in 1950,
two years after the illegal depar-
ture of his son.

Jiri Stembera is himself re-
membered in Bratislava as a re-
porter for the sport magazine
Start, who carried a passport
entitling him to cover interna-
tional sports events, and who
after one such trip in 1948 re-
mained abroad.

So much for his 13 months in
a Communist dungeon. .

This story with its insignifi-
cant hero and unimaginative
plot, would not be worth the
telling, if it were not part of a
campaign of provocation and mis-
information in which any stick is
good enough to beat a dog and

‘any lie is supposed to be good

enough to create international
ill-will, provided it is repeated
often enough.

of

long as the People’s Republic of
China was not given its “right-
ful place in the United Nations.”
At the same time the two pre-
miers, who represent populations
totalling 600 million people, an-
nounced details of the most im-
portant trade agreement in India’s
history.

Under it, India is to receive
a million tons of steel from
the Soviet Union in the next
three years, starting with 300,-
000 tons in 1956.

The Soviet’ Union will also
supply India with oil, mining and
other equipment to be agreed
upon and undertakes to increase
purchases of raw materials and
manufactured goods from India.

Earlier Soviet Communist party
secretary N. K. Khrushchev de-
clared that the Soviet Union has
no intention of creating conflict
between India and the West.

He added that India was in no
way inferior to any of the Five
Great Powers—‘“and I wish you
to be in. the forefront of the
comity of nations.”

Referring to foreign press
criticisms of his opposition to
colonialism, he said:

“We do not want to create any
conflict between you and the
United States or Britain. But

this does not mean we should not
”»

JOHN FOSTER D
His cloven hoof showed

Dulles’ remarks
‘insult te Asians’

DELHI

U.S. Secretary of State John
Foster Dulles’ description of Goa
as a “Portuguese province” has
touched off demonstrations
against the U.S. in Delhi.

An angry crowd visited the
U.S. embassy with a letter ad-
dressed to Dulles. —

“Your statement,” it said, “is
insulting to the sentiments of
millions of Asians who have suf-
fered long under colonial mis-
rule and have liberated them-
selves only recently.”

Dulles had said that “the
world” regarded Goa as a Por-
tuguese province and that it had
been for 400 years. The U.S.
stood by Portugal.

“The cloven hoof of colonial-
ism peeped out,” commented the
Times of India. “The genius John
Foster Dulles has for lousing up
American foreign affairs has
never shoné more brilliantly,”
said the New York Post.

be no lasting peace in Asia so’

USSR, India jointly
call for H-bomb ban

A joint call for unconditional prohibition of the production, use and experimen-
tation of nuclear weapons was made here last week by Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal
Nehru and Soviet Premier Bulganin, at the conclusion of the Soviet leaders’ visit.

The joint communique condemned the formation of military alliances and blocs,

which it said, only ‘‘widened the frontiers of the cold war.”
It declared that there could,

.

Journey to Tibet--2. :

[Second in a series of articles
by the London Daily Worker’s
correspondent in China.]

By ALAN WINNINGTON

: LHASA, Tibet

Imagine driving in an open car
to Nottingham about the time of
Robin Hood and you can get
some impression of the last miles
to Lhasa along the new road
from China.

In sparse barley fields, peas-
ants with long matted hair, dress-
ed in unbleached .
homespun, patch-
ed and shapeless,
lean on their *
hoes to watch §
the car. Women
with' open bod-
ces feed their
babies or scream
axiously as some
urchins dare
each other to
cross in front of the jeep.

When we wave, the peasants
touch their forelocks and put
out their tongues in greeting.

We come to a section where
Tibetans are working on the road
—for wages, a rare thing in
Tibet. As we fly past they jump
and clap their hands. They lack
the subservience of the peasants.

Slipping through valley after
gorgeous valley, the new road
follows the river past monasteries
and stone-built houses of the
rich.

A splash of bright color in the
distance turns out to be a noble-
woman with an escort of three
gallants, who pass us waving,
with their harness jingling.

What seem to be automobiles
on legs are men carrying the big
light boats of yak-skin stretched
on a frame. Enormous ravens
hop lazily out of the way but
mastiffs remain sleeping, exactly
in the middle of the road.

In the distance is a black
rain-cloud, with the sun behind
it sending out blinding rays that
hide everything below in dark-
ness. Suddenly the sun comes
through, lighting up the whole
valley.

And there in front is Lhasa—
legendary Lhasa—with the gold-
en-roofed Potala Palace domin-
ating the whole landscape and
making the mountains them-
selves seem insignificant.

es 5 e3 m

I had come 1,500 miles by jeep
to reach this city and it was a
moment I shall never forget. I
can understand the feelings of
a pilgrim after walking the same
distance when he first sees the
Potala, where the Dalai Lama

| lives, and knows that he has at

last reached his goal.

Lhasa, 12,000 feet above sea
level, is the capital of the Tibetan
region of China, seat of the local
government headed. by the Dalai
Lama and holy of holies for
Lamaists everywhere.

Splendid as the city is from
afar, at close quarters there has
clearly been little change in sani-
tation and layout since the 7th
century. .

First glimpse of life
in legendary Lhasa

That was when Tibet’s most
popular king married @ Chinese
princess and set up house where
the Potala now stands.

It is a city of religion, aristoc-
racy and commerce and their
counterparts — pilgrims, serfs
and beggars.

Until the new power station
is completed, a tottering old 100
kilowatt generator, which was
repaired by the People’s Liber-
ation Army, supplies a limited
number of flickering bulbs part
of the day.

Lorries are now bringing téas
from inland China and the price
of this Tibetan éssential has gone
down.

Shanghai cigarettes, vacuum
bottles and other consumer goods
are popular, but yaks and camels
still toil into Lhasa daily from

‘| India and Nepal with lightweight

luxury goods sewn up in the
skins of their departed brothers.

In this town, that never saw
a wheeled vehicle before last
year, the most obvious thing is
traffic. It simply was not de-
signed for anything but men on
foot and horseback. Its narrow,
winding streets become quag-
mires at the least hint of rain.

I turned my jeep into one
street the other day to find my-
self facing a convoy of tea lor-
ries from inland China. I stop-
ped, the crowd closed in to ex-
amine the foreigners and that
was that.

It took an hour to sort out
the traffic jam.

Apart from traffic there are
many signs of the new road’s
effect.

Without the road it would not
have been possible to equip the
hospital, experimental farm,
schools or newspaper.

In the case of the Tibetan lan-
guage newspaper, there was not
even any Tibetan type until the-
first was cast in Peking.

Among the wealthy here, it
is fashionable to use steel girders
in the ceilings of houses. For- ~
merly these were shipped in sec-
tions of less than a yard long
and then bolted together, because
a yak can carry only 120 pounds.

Now the new bridges over the
river at Lhasa and Shigatse, as
well as many others on the road,
are of steel girder construction. ©

As yet the new things are
hardly visible on the surface. The
main streets of the town are
still as they were: covered with
stalls, with dogs sleeping in the
remaining patches of sunlight;
piltrims, dervishes and beggars
twirl prayer wheels and beg —
very successfully, I understand.

From my window I can see
women and children carrying
water up to the top of the 900-
foot high Potala, for every drop
iba i here has to be carried
still. : nee
Down below high officials in
their gold robes and hats
clanking past on Mongolian
ponies, escorted by half a dozen
servants in red-fringed hats
electric lampshades.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — DECEMBER 23, 1955 — PAGE 3

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