Paris, Dec. 18.
Hope for a "Christmas peace" in Spain—on the third Christmas the country has passed under bombs, cold and hunger—faded completely today when the French Foreign Office received an indirect refusal from General Francisco Franco.
French war veterans, backed by Cardinal Verdier on behalf of French Cutholics, in parallel demarches made to Burgos and Barcelona recently had suggested that the fighting be interrupted for a Week or a month beginning at Christmas time.
The official mission representing General Franco here said that the General's refusal was based on the grounds that Spain was at war over an issue involving the life or death of ihe nation. Therefore the war cannot be stopped, the Nationalist leader is reported to have said, since such a move might be interpreted as a weakness in the Nationalists' determination to oust the Republicans. The Nationalists also indicated they feared such a truce might be taken advantage of by neutrals who would try to propose mediation, which General Franco has flatly rejected in advance.—United Press,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.