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Show ' : ' Offer of Peace Declared Used to Kidnap Britons Two Agents Seized in Netherlands While Probing Proposals, London Spokesman Says LONDON, Nov. 24 (AP) Authoritative British sources said today that the two Britons seized November 8 by the German gestapo on the German-Netherlands border were endeavoring to see if a German "peace offer was bona fide." These sources said Captain Richard Rich-ard Henry Stevens and Sigismund Payne Best were acting with the knowledge of the British government govern-ment when they were "kidnaped." The "peace proposals" came from "some German sources," a British spokesman said. Everything Stevens Ste-vens and Best learned "was transmitted trans-mitted to their own government and It was In the course of the endeavors en-deavors to see If the peace offer was bona fide that they were kidnaped," kid-naped," he asserted, Th spokesmen confirmed reports re-ports from Amsterdam that a Netherlands observer was accompanying accom-panying Best and Stevens when they were taken by th gestapo. Replying to German charges that the British Inspired the Munich explosion ex-plosion November 8 in which Adolf Hitler escaped death or Injury by a few minutes, the British spokesman, spokes-man, said the gestapo must either have known the bomb was In the cellar long before It exploded or admit to "gross Inefficiency." In case they knew, th spokesman spokes-man continued, the explosion was "either to Inflame hatred against th British or whip up th German people's waning enthusiasm for Hitler." Th spokesman did not reveal the nature of th purported peace proposal or from what German faction It was supposed to have come. He said the British believe Stevens and Best, from German reports, re-ports, are now In Berlin. Previously the London Dally Mall's .diplomatic correspondent said Stevens and Best had been in communication with highly placed Germans and on November 9 they received an Invitation to meet a German envoy at Venloo, on the border. . .. ' Th correspondent declared, (CoaUnuod on Pan Four) (Column Sn) GERMAN KIDNAP ' TRAPJJHARGED (OeatkuH best rw Om) however, that at no time did they convey any British proposal!, to their German contacts. He said there were assurances that Stevens Ste-vens and Best were acting "merely as postmen" without power to commit the British government - "It now becomes doubtful whether the Invitation to receive the "peace proposals' came from a source with authority to make them," the article said, adding that doubt was expressed in London that Stevens and Best were still alive. |