MEASURES TAKEN BY THE AUSTRIAN GOVERNMENT AGAINST SERBIAN IRREDENTISM IN BOSNIA

Vienna: Just after 11 o'clock yesterday morning, the [Austrian] cabinet met at the Foreign Office to discuss the impact of the Sarajevo tragedy . . . Daily Die Zeit has learned from reliable sources that the cabinet was especially concerned with the results of the enquiry into the Sarajevo killings as well as learning of the Bosnian government's reform proposals to be introduced in Bosnia in order to paralyse Serbian irredentist propaganda.

The military administrators [of Bosnia] are particularly interested in these reforms given that certain public services, including post and telegraph, are under military control. It is believed that no military measures against Serbia were ordered at this cabinet meeting.

However, according to Die Zeit, during army meetings on Sunday and Monday . . . there was much discussion about what sort of measures would be taken if the results of the currently ongoing enquiry in Sarajevo required a military response . . . As of now, the enquiry seems to suggest that such a military intervention would be improbable, given that it believes the [assassination] was the work of a group of madmen.

Viennese sources reported on July 4th that no facts have yet emerged which prove that this act was part of a conspiracy that had been organised and prepared by senior figures in the neighbouring state [Serbia]. News from Budapest is that the Serbian Prime Minister Nikola Pasic has given an interview to the Az Est paper in which . . . he rejects the accusations against Serbia made in the Austro-Hungarian press, accusations which tend "to compromise Austro-Serb relations" . . .

In the meantime, the Belgrade correspondent of the Paris paper Le Temps reports [Serbian] troop movements around the town of Mitrovitza. The troops are currently stationed in the town and in nearby villages, whilst these movements have prompted all manner of speculation.

In reality, they have been ordered as a security measure against any eventual [Austrian] reprisal that would be prompted by an uprising of the Serb and Croat populations, people who have long been subject to violence and persecution.

At the same time, as Austro-Hungarian troops have been gathering along the Serbian border, various defence works have been hastily put in place. Teams of workers toil by day and by night. In this way, the Serbian military hope to prepare a strategic defence line that runs from Pancevo to Kovin.

La Stampa

July 8th, 1914