BRITISH SUPPORT

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 61, 13 March 1944, Page 3

BRITISH SUPPORT

ACTION BY AMERICA

Previous Consultations On Note To Eire British Official Wireless Rec. 10.30 a.m. RUGBY, Mar. 12. The British Government's support of the recent United States Note to Eire is made perfectly clear in a Note sent to Eire by the British Government. This said that the United States Government recently consulted the British Government on the proposal to address to the Eire Government a request for the removal of the Axis diplomatic corps representatives in Eire. It was with the full concurrence of the British Government that the United States Government made this approach. , . The British Government desired to make it clear to the Eire Government that it warmly welcomed the initiative taken by the United States Government, and fully supported the request for the removal from Eire of the German and Japanese diplomatic and consular representatives. The _ Government also emphasised the importance it attached to this request. In reply, Mr. de Valera enclosed a copy of the reply handed to the United States Department of State by the IrisK Minister to Washington on March 7. . . Any lingering notion that Britain takes a less serious view than the United States of the maintenance in Dublin of enemy "diplomatic" missions has been completely removed by the British Press. In London it has long been notorious that Dublin is a valuable listening post where Britain's mortal enemies can spy in the very midst of the British Isles. Saved By British Air Power That such a thing was tolerated even in the hour of Britain's mortal danger is sufficient proof of the reality of the independence enjoyed by members of the British Commonwealth. Moreover, there was a time when the Eire Government might reasonably have feared German reprisals. Thanks to British air power that time is over. Such considerations were probably never seriously expected to influence Mr. de Valera. The present rulers of Southern Ireland long ago made up their minds not to take off their historic blinkers, even with total war raging round their country's shores.

However, it is perfectly true, as the Daily Mail points out, that, much as the British. Commonwealth regrets Eire's neutrality, it does not question Eire's inherent right, even while remaining in the Commonwealth, to determine its own affairs. British regret, too, is mollified by remembrance of that great company of Southern Irishmen who, in all branches of the Services, in high <?r humble places, are fighting to aid the common cause. None of that, however, alters the fact that the presence of enemy agents, endowed with diplomatic immunity, in a place so situated as Dublin, is a grave danger to the gigantic operations which evidently are impending in the British theatre of war. The United Nations can afford to neglect nothing which would contribute to the success of these operations.