HC Deb 29 June 1877 vol 235 c485
MR. E. POWER

asked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, If the Government have received any information as to the atrocities alleged to have been committed by the Russians upon the Mussulman population of the Caucasus; if he is in a position to state whether or not the Russian Army, in addition to pillaging and burning Mussulman villages, and compelling the inhabitants to declare themselves orthodox Christians, under pain of being immediately put to death; if women and girls are being massacred after undergoing the most frightful outrages; that the male inhabitants who are spared are being sent to Siberia; and that these atrocities are being accomplished by the orders and under the eyes of the chiefs of the Russian Army?

MR. BOURKE

Sir, the Turkish Ambassador in London has communicated to Her Majesty's Government a telegram from the Porte which states that the atrocities enumerated in this Question have been committed; but Her Majesty's Government have no means of obtaining other information, as they have at the present moment no Military Attaché serving with the Russian Army in Asia and no Consular Agents in the districts occupied by Russian troops.