The daily monitor. (Mount Clemens, Mich.) 1940-1942, 1941-04-02
War

(COntlnoo0 rom rage ID
men himself told q special press
conference in the; Italian capital
that he had had several talks
with Italian Foreign Minister
Count Galeaxzo Ciano ION ques-
tons Of the most pressing i'm.
portance."
N;atsuoka likewise described
his conversation yesterday with
Mussolini as "a frank exchange
of views on all problems inter.
esting to the two countries and
the world"
Belgrade an Italian lega.
ion spokesman indicated Ital.
ian-Y slav conversations.
which had given rise to reports
of possible mediation by Musso.
lini in the Yugoslav-Germap
crisis, have attained no results
and no negotiations are in prog.
reSs."
The spokesman said the con.
versations had been held Ito see
if any possibilities existed for
establishing contact b tw n
Belgrade and Rome"
British troops were reported
today to have trapped nearly
100000 Italian soldiers in Fast
Africa in twin drives into EN-
peror Halle Selassie's African
rooftop kingdom of Ethiopia
and the Italian colony of Fri
trea.
Dispatches from Cairo said
the British seizure of Asmara,
capital of Eritrea, had thrust the
survivors Of 10000 Italian troops
from the bloody battle of Cheren
into pocket with their backs to
the Red Sea-where the British
navy bars retreat.
In Ethiopia, conquered by the
British in 1886, British col
umns striking inland from cap
tured Diredawa were reported
pressing towards Adds Ababa,
the capital. About 10000 Ital-
ians, led by the Duke of Aosta,
were said to be encircled there.
Premier Mussolini's high COM
mand asserted that Fascist troops
were putting up still resist
ance against numerically supe-
rior British forces" in the Awash
river valley, between Diredawa
and Adds Ababa.
The British command of Red
Sea waters was highligfted by
a London admiralty com :
munique noting that naval air.
craft had sunk a 1,526-ton Ital-
ian destroyer after it left Mas
sua harbor and that a 4,188-ton
German merchant ship had been
intercepted" by British war
ship when it attempted to escape
from the port.
Massaua lies only IS miles by
rail from fallen Asmara.
In North Africa, axis COM
muniques reported that German
and Italian troops were pressing
offensive operations against Gen.
Sir Archibald p. Wavell's Lib
va desert campaigners and had
advanced 80 miles eastward.
Hitler's high command said
the British hastily retreated to
Agedabia after a clash with Nazi
mechanical units.
Presumably a considerable
force of Gen. Wavelrs Libyan
armies has now been shifted to
Greece, leaving only defensive
garrisons to block the combined
Nazi-Fascist counter offensive
in North Africa.
Diplomatic maneuvering kept
abreast of warlike preparations
in the Balkans today. with
Yugoslavia apparently intent
on plumbing all aspects of the
tangled international situation
before clarifying her attitude
toward the axis powers.
Germany watched the Yugoslav
governments actions with signs
of increasing annoyance and also
kept a close eye o developments
in the western hemisphere as
Latin American nations, follow
ing the lead of the United States,
took additional axis merchant
ships into protective custody
The well-informed Nazi COM
mentary, Dienst Aus Deutsch-
land, declared frankly that Ger
man-Yugoslav relations steadily
were growing more serious. The
Reich government, this source
said, was provoked especially