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Show BELGIAN PEOPLE ARE STARVING I ' BELGIAN WORKING CLASSES . THREATENED WITH SLAVERY, STARVATION OR DEATH Germans Decree Is "Either You Must Sign a Con- ! tract for Work in Germany, or You Will Be Taken as Slaves" Must Pay Immense War Levy. f WASHINGTON, March 27. An ap- peal from Belgian workmen for organ ized assistance by neutral governments ! and laboring classes in neutral nations na-tions was made public at the Belgian 1 legation today, t Bays five hundred thousand men have been thrown out if work and forced info idleness which i J, lias led flu' Germans to decree that p "either you must sign a contract for ! work in Germany or you will be taken as slaves." As a result, it adds, the whole of the working classes of Bel- i glum nre threatened with slavery, starvation star-vation or death "Germany," the appeal says, "has condemned her victims to pay an im- mense war levy which already amounts to more than $200,000,000 and which is increasing at the rate of $10,-000.000 $10,-000.000 monthly. "She has carried off and transported into Germany by pillage, confiscation, requisition and forced sale, foodstuffs and merchandise to the value of more than ,M .000,000.000. She has seized and sent to Germany the greater part of the raw products in our factories, the machinery and all accessories; she has thus stopped our industry and caused an almost general and enforced state of idleness of the working I classes" The plight of those deported is pic-' tured as painful. Word From Deported Men. w ii wkk, France, March 27, noon. The Belgian government has received trustworthy-means letters from responsible respon-sible Belgians who have been deport ed to Germany. The letters, dated at the end of February or early in March, were written from the camps in which the men are being confined. Some passages follow: "Since February 1 wo had only two meals a day. The one in the evening has been discontinued. That was the best one because we had corn." Dying of Famine. From another letter: "It is frightful here. We are dying of famine. We have had a ration of bread, water and beets. That Is all, We are skeletons covered with skin. (.Thirteen were counted in the morgue yesterday and fourteen today. That Is from among the 3,000 or 4.r00 here. Conditions are more frightful in the nnd camps If anyone give? ns a little soup or something else to eat he is punished with five days in prison." From another letter: "The situation becomes more and more unendurable from day to day Every morning two or three dead are found in the huts. The doctors decline de-cline all responsibility. Today 120 are dead at Camp . We hope for our deliverance by the great offensive." oo |