North American Rayon Corp., seventh largest U.S. rayon yarn maker, and its sister company American Bemberg Corp., have had a troubled history. In 1940 the U.S. Government, suspecting that their parent company, the Dutch Algemeene Kunstzijde Unie, N.V. ("AKU"), was partly German-controlled, froze the properties, but allowed the U.S. directors to run the companies.
Last August the Department of Justice's Office of Alien Property seized the two AKU subsidiaries. The Dutch protested, but when OAP proved that one-third of AKU's stock had been German-owned, the Dutch waived rights to one-third of AKU's holdings. This gave the Office of Alien...