Imperial Valley Press

De Gaulle To Press Claim For Reparations at Meet

WASHINGTON. Aug. 21. (UP) - Gen. Charles de Gaulle arrives here Wednesday for a conference with President Truman at which he is expected to press France's claims for "Big Five" status and ask American support of France's demand for $60,000,000,000 reparations from Germany and Italy.

De Gaulle and his foreign minister, George Bidault, will bring with them the official document by which France ratifies the United Nations charter.

This delivery by hand of France's approval of the San Francisco charter was expected in French circles to lend weight to France's insistence on equal status with the United States, Britain, Russia and China in the settlement of world affairs, including negotiations for the capitulation of Japan.

De Gaulle also is expected to explain France's delay in acceptance of the Potsdam plan, which the Big Three asked her to approve and adhere to. The proposed reparations distribution, highly unfavorable to France in comparison with the Big Three, and her failure to obtain control of the Ruhr and the whole of the western bank of the Rhine from Switzerland to Holland are believed to be the main reasons for France's failure so far to accept the Potsdam decisions.

France feels she was not given a voice in a problem which concerns her more than any other western power. She wanted to be invited to Potsdam but received no bid.