NEW MEASURES IN CYPRUS

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27795, 21 October 1955, Page 13

NEW MEASURES IN CYPRUS

Security Network To Aid Police (N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) (Rec. 9 p.m.) LONDON, October 20. The Governor of Cyprus, Sir John Harding, said last night that he was building up a new security network in Cyprus which would grow into a spider’s web across the island. “I hope that eventually the terrorists and intimidators will become the flies,” he said. Sir John Harding, who was addressing a press conference, said that the soldiers were being used to “underpin” the police who were “insufficiently strong to do the job” and lacked the essential intelligence service. He was satisfied that there were sufficient troops on the island to deal with the situation. The use of force would be reduced to the necessary minimum, he said.

Previous orders to pull down Greek flags and to wash out enosis (union with Greece) slogans had been cancelled.

“For the time being, such child-like activities should be ignored,” said Sir John Harding. “I will not have my forces insulted,” he said.

Sir John Harding said that he had started a system of “underpinning” the Cyprus police force with British troops as an effective means to assure security in the island. The Governor said that the police, without »n intelligence system, had had their morale shaken by terrorist activities against them. His long-term aim, he said, was to develop a police force with an intelligence organisation which was essential if it were to be an instrument fully capable of maintaining security. For security, purposes he had divided the island into seven areas, each with a military commander, a civilian commissioner and a police superintendent. Orders to Troops “I have issued definite orders to the troops that whenever they carry out police duties they will use police methods —batons, tear gas, etc. They will use lethal weapons only as a last resort,” he said. Sir John Harding also said the way was still open for further talks with Archbishop Makarios, the man who leads the movement for enosis. “I never exclude the possibility of a solution in the political field,” he told correspondents. The Admiralty announced in London that two British aircraft-carriers would shortly load military vehicles for Cyprus. In Famagusta, armed British troops with police and tear-gas squads went into action today to break up a demonstration by 2000 Greek students in Famagusta. The demonstration began as British troops with mine-detectors searched sections of the town for stolen arms. Students poured out of the schoolyards into adjoining streets shouting anti-British and enosis slogans.