ABJECT APOLOGY.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 58, Issue 35, 20 November 1937, Page 8

ABJECT APOLOGY.

ARTICLES IN NATAL PAPER. MUSSOLINI’S HOME LIFE. (United Press Association—Copyright.) PRETORIA, November 18. The South African Government has apologised to Italy for two articles in a Natal newspaper commenting on Signor Mussolini’s home life. The official statement says : “The Union Government expresses the sincerest regret to the Italian Government for the extreme bad taste and utter lack of consideration for the feelings of the Italian people, and offers to the Italian-Government and people the sincerest apologies.”

RESENTED BY NEWSPAPERS. A SENSE OF HUMILIATION. (Received This Day, 11.35 a.m.) CAPETOWN, Nov. 19. The Government’s abject apology to the Italian Government for the articles which appeared in the Natal ‘‘Mercury’’ referring to the private lives of Signor Mussolini and his family is resented by the English press. The “Argus,” while admitting that certain passages show, in the words of the apology, “extreme bad taste and lack of consideration for the feelings of the Italian people,” stresses that the Government was not responsible for a single word in the press. The Government cannot apologise for the press. The “Mercury” says that the foolish apology will bring to freedom-loving people a sense of humiliation that the Government had publicly prostrated itself in such an abject fashion.