Papers and Documents relating to the Foreign Relations of Hungary, Volume 1, 1919–1920 (Budapest, 1939)

Documents

160 1920 Arrests, imprisonments and expulsion of Hungarians occur every day. At the beginning of December, 21 Hungarians were arrested as hostages in the village of Alsólendva; they are kept imprisoned in Belgrade and their food consists of bread only. From the same village, a number of Hungarian families have been expelled, despite the fact that railroad communications have been suspended and these people exposed to exceptionally cold weather. My repeated protests were of no avail. Dr. F. J., county doctor, 64 years of age, is in prison because he declared before an Allied mission that his district contains 22 villages of exclusively Magyar population. Hungarian commissioned and non-commissioned officers residing in the occupied territories are continuously arrested. To our knowledge more than 300 Hungarian officers are in prison, among them Lieutenant-Colonel Riffl. Even our liaison-officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Stephen Inselt, has been arrested recently. They are accused on flimsy and manufactured evidence of high treason, espionage, inciting to revolt; treated as ordinary criminals, subject to the third degree. At the same time, the Yugoslav occupying authorities openly support anti-Hungarian communist movements. Last Christmas meetings of communists in Pécs were authorized. Communist newspapers freely circulate in Pécs while the Hungarian christian-socialist daily of that city has been suppressed. To the peasants the promise of radical land reform is held out and they are urged to vote for Yugoslavia, should a plebiscite be ordered. What the Yugoslavs hope to accomplish by these manoeuvres is that the communists will revolt and supply proof that these territories ought to remain under Yugoslav occupation in order to maintain public peace. In the Vend territory, Yugoslav troops, before evacuation, force the inhabitants to sign declarations to the effect that they desire to be „liberated" from Hungarian oppression and to be incorporated into Yugoslavia. You are requested to emphasize in the note that the Hungarian Government has acted promptly and loyally on every Yugoslav complaint submitted to it, but our protests are never acted upon. You should also point out that the Hungarian population of the occupied territories is desperate and that public opinion in Hungary itself is increasingly disturbed by the reports of these incessant atrocities.