Evening star., 1940-03-25
Britain Believes
Nazis Engineer Grab
For Rumanian Oil
Buehurest's Expulsion Of
Reuters Correspondent
Laid to German Intrigue
BY the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press.
LONDON, March 25.-Britain's
warships secured Germany's North
Sea shipping lanes today in an effort
to strangle her trade with Scandi-
navia while suspicion mounted that
the Reich might be engineering q
grab of Rumania's oil.
Much British attention centered
on the Balkans as a possible coming
'hot spot" of the war.
The press interpreted the expul-
sion from Rumania of Maurice Low
ell, Bucharest correspondent Of
Reuters, British news agency, as an
incident in Nazi intrigue to get
hold of Rumania's oil.
The Daily Mails Bucharest CORE
spondent laid Lovell's expulsion to
the work of 10000 German agents
who have begun a vast campaign to
undermine and disintegrate the Ru-
manian nation"
Energetic Diplomacy Urged.
Energetic diplomacy was demand
ed by the News Chronicle, which de-
clared "it is of supreme Importance
to the allies that Rumania should
not be coerced into accepting the
Nazi embrace"
Large and increasing British
French forces are marshaled at the
eastern end of the Mediterranean
ready to act wherever they are
needed" the Daily Telegraph COM
mented.
"Rumania and Ycgoslavia know
well that their interests, like their
sympathies, are on the side Of the
allies"
Britain looks toward the arrival
OF Rumanian trade mission a
week from today as an opportunity
to improve commercial relations be-
tween London and Bucharest. The
delegation is to negotiate a new
clearing agreement.
Complaints BY Norway.
Norways Minister to London has
made complaints to Britain alleging
infringement of Norwegian neutral
1ty during recent days, but there
was no immediate British comment,
In Oslo the Norwegian admiralty
said there had been at least two
instances of trespassing by British
warships and a possible third was
being investigated
But the Daily Mail observed that
neutrals already have been
warned" particularly by Winston
Churchill, first lord of the admiralty,
that they are not playing the game
and the navy are (sic) only trying
to stop the leaks and make our
blockade 100 per cent effective"
Answering Norway's previous pro-
test in the Altmark case, when a
British destroyer forced the Ger
man prison vessel aground on the
Norwegian coast, Prime Minister
Chamberlain accused Norway's gov
ernment Of complete indifference
as to the use which might be made
OF their territorial waters by the
German fleet"
Third Blow at Reich.
Pushing her sea blockade further
from nome shores, Britain counted a
third blow against Germany's mer-
chant marine in the mine infested
waters Of the Eastern North Sea.
Naval action was credited for the
grounding Of the 5,000-ton German
freighter Ostprussen. which ran
ashore on Jutland with a cargo of
coke after zig-zagging for three days
to escape British searchers off the
west coast of Denmark. This fol-
lowed sinking yesterday of the Ger
man collier Edmund Hugo SHINES
by British submarine.
The Admiralty acknowledged one
casualty-the 210-ton naval trawler
Loeb Assater, which was sunk by a
mine off the Northern Scottish coast.
the former Aberdeen fishing
boat. converted to war use, was the
British Nays 31st loss of the war.
1t had survived a German bombing
attack in January