A Sequel to the Moscow Trial The , " Trotskyist conspiracy,"
for which Zinoviev, Kamenev and fourteen others paid the supreme penalty in Moscow just over a month ago, has vanished from the headlines of the Soviet and the world Press as suddenly as it appeared. But an interesting sequel to the trial of the Sixteen is the announcement a few days ago that Yagoda, the head of the Commissariat of Internal Defence (the department which took over the functions of G.P.U. two years ago), has been appointed to the Commissariat of Posts and Telegraphs—a non-political sinecure formerly held by Rykov when he had fallen fidrn favour. Although it is inconceivable that the trial could have been decided on and conducted without Stalin's complete approval, its results were such as to cast a shadow on the department immediately responsible ; and just as the Metro-Vickers Trial was followed by a complete reorganisation of the G.P.U., so the recent trial has led to the downfall of a man hitherto regarded as belonging to the inner counsels of the party. Yagoda's successor is one Yezhov, unknown except as an assistant secretary of the Party and therefore a direct subordinate of Stalin himself.
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