LONDON The House of Commons voted by 222 votes to none this evening to give a second reading to a bill that suspends local elections in Great Britain until the end of 1940.

LONDON Britain plans to keep its trade agreements with Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania unchanged and wants trade with them to continue as far as the war allows, the President of the Board of Trade, Oliver Stanley, told the House of Commons today.

LONDON Soldiers in France may send home as many letters as they wish, and orders are being issued to stop any limit being imposed, the Secretary of State for War, Leslie Hore-Belisha, told the House of Commons today.

LONDON The British Government is setting up a central agency for questions about Polish refugees, to be run by Sir Francis Humphrys at the Foreign Office, the Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, R. A. Butler, told the House of Commons today.

LONDON Britain estimates that 13 German submarines have been sunk since the war began six weeks ago, and that five more have been seriously damaged and possibly sunk, the First Lord of the Admiralty, Winston Churchill, told the House of Commons today.

LONDON A night boat train from Euston to Heysham has collided with a goods train at Winwick Junction in Lancashire, according to a report from London. Three people were injured, one of them seriously.

TOKYO A typhoon has caused severe damage and loss of life on Okinawa and is moving towards Kyushu, according to a report from Tokyo.

ROME Adolf Hitler does not intend to make a fresh peace move, a German spokesman has said, according to Rome radio, as reported in London today.

OTTAWA Four Canadian passengers from the liner Athenia are claiming a total of $2,000 in damages from Germany, according to an official statement in Ottawa.

CALCUTTA The Legislative Assembly of Bihar, a province in north-eastern India, has passed a resolution calling on Britain to declare that it recognises India as an independent nation, the Calcutta correspondent of The Times reports.

BERLIN German aircraft hit two British cruisers in the Firth of Forth yesterday, according to a German communiqué issued in Berlin today.

LONDON A train crossed the Forth Bridge while German aircraft were attacking warships nearby yesterday, according to a passenger quoted in a London report today.

LONDON A Danish ship, the Silicien, has landed 27 survivors from a Greek steamer that was sunk at sea, according to a report from London today. Two men from the Greek ship died and seven were injured, the report says.

LONDON Four German bombers were brought down during yesterday's air attacks on the Firth of Forth, according to a joint communiqué from the Admiralty, the Air Ministry and the Ministry of Home Security.

LONDON The German Navy High Command has dropped its claim that the submarine which sank HMS Royal Oak also torpedoed the battlecruiser Repulse, according to reports from Berlin.

KAUNAS The Polish minister in Kaunas, the Lithuanian capital, has protested against Lithuania taking over Vilna, saying the Soviet Union has no right to transfer the city, the BBC reports.

PARIS German troops attacked along a front of about four miles east of the Moselle river yesterday, according to the French evening communiqué issued in Paris, the Associated Press reports from London.