I wish to raise the question of political prisoners in North Africa. I realise that it is a very delicate subject. I realise fully that our men are fighting side by side with Americans and Frenchmen in North Africa, and I would be horrified if any words of mine were to do anything to make their task more difficult. I would like to say at the outset that I know, as indeed we all know here, that North Africa is ruled by France, ruled by General Giraud, and not by us. Any remarks that I make will be made, if I may do so, to General Giraud through the Under-Secretary. What is the position to-day? The latest figures that we have of prisoners were given on 10th February in a reply by the Foreign Secretary to my hon. Friend the Members for North Lambeth (Mr. G. Strauss). He said that 903 prisoners had been released and that 5,407 were still detained on that date. But on 23rd February there appeared an article in "The Times" newspaper which I would like to quote, because the figures contained therein were somewhat different from those given by the Foreign Secretary: The weight of evidence, including that which comes from official French sources, goes to show that on November 8th there were between 9,500 and 10,000 political prisoners and refugees detained in North Africa. General Bergeret was correct in saying that 1,300 had since been released. Thus, in fact, the figures remaining must be somewhere between 8,000 and 9,000. Why this discrepancy between the two sets of figures? I think it arises from the fact that the figures given by the right hon. Gentleman dealt only with those people actually detained in prison camps, and not with those people who because they had resisted arrest were placed in civil and military prisons rather than in prison camps. I understood that a distinction is made and those people who resist arrest are placed in prisons, and not in prison camps. Who are these men? Every one of them, to the best of my knowledge, is an anti-Fascist. Some have national representatives who can speak for them. Many have no national representatives. Included among these are Austrians, Germans, Hungarians and Italians, all of whom have proved in actual combat that they are anti-Fascist, willing to do their utmost to drive Fascism from Europe.

I come to the important question of how they are treated. I wish to give the House some information that I have obtained to-day from a man who was himself in one of the prison camps and who vouches for the accuracy of this information. The information, as far as I can tell—and I say it, naturally, with reserve—is accurate up to 15th January this year. I refer to the camp at Djelfa. In this camp there are in the neighbourhood of 1,500 people, living under canvas in the desert, without even elementary sanitation. Typhus is frequent. Large numbers of young men between 20 and 30 are said to be getting tuberculosis. There is no medical treatment for these men. There is no exemption from work even for the sick. Instead, anybody reporting sick gets 10 to 20 days in the cells, on bread and water for three days with a hot meal on the fourth. The prisoners are sent to dungeons in Fort Cavacelli, and are often, so the report says, actually horsewhipped naked, in front of other prisoners.