U.S. Mediators

Both British and Greek soldiers in Athens have been perplexed by the fact that Americans, though allies of Greece and Britain, took no part in the struggle against ELAS. But last week two young U.S. Army doctors helped solve the most serious problem left unsolved by the truce --the fate of some 10,000 civilian hostages captured and held by the ELAS forces.

The Americans were Captain Robert Moyers of Iowa, and Captain Harvey Dane of New York. Both had spent many months with the ELAS guerrillas, tending their sick and wounded during the German occupation of Greece. With British permission, they crossed the lines last week and persuaded the ELAS leaders that they should free most of their hostages and thereby clear the way for a conference with the Greek Government. The Greek Premier, General Nicholas Plastiras, had announced that he would not deal with ELAS until the hostages were freed.

In Athens some 10,000 civilians, suspected of supporting ELAS, were being investigated before release. This week peace talks were due to begin.

Light was shed last week on an important aspect of the Greek situation which has been overlooked except by the British Government: how much was ELAS influenced by the Communist Party, the central group in EAM? ELD (Union of Popular Democracy) and SKE (Socialist Party of Greece), two of the biggest parties, both of which recently broke with EAM, had issued statements. The Central Committee of the SKE declared that: "It refused all responsibility for, and withdrew itself from, the EAM bloc as soon as it was informed of the armed breach which took place without consultation of the SKE."

The Central Committee of the ELD declared: "The armed breach occurred without the knowledge, approval or consent of the ELD or any of its representatives. . . . Forcible seizure of power within the organization of EAM at the expense of ELD and other cooperating parties automatically severs every connecting link with EAM." Salonika representatives of ELD, SKE and the Agrarian Party (another EAM group) declared that the civil war had been caused "by the irreconcilable policy of the Communist Party." They warned that Bulgars and Yugoslavs had been fighting with the ELAS forces and that Greece might lose Macedonia or Thrace to Yugoslavia or Bulgaria.

The Russian-controlled Sofia radio, meanwhile, broadcast an appeal to ELAS to try its hostages as "war criminals," enemies of the people of Athens. It also launched a drive for an autonomous Macedonia (which might include Greece's No. 2 port of Salonika), with a capital at Skoplje--which is in Yugoslavia.

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