Salazar Praises Colonial Policy

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30737, 29 April 1965, Page 19

Salazar Praises Colonial Policy

(N.Z.P.A.- Reuter —Copyright? LISBON, April 27. The world would continue to accuse Portugal of colonial oppression though it fed and cared for half-starved families crossing the border into its African overseas territories, the Portuguese Prime Minister (Dr. Antonio Salazar) said tonight.

Speaking to former members of a Portuguese youth movement on the 37th anniversary of his rise to power. Dr. Salazar said the Portuguese were convinced they were fighting their colonial wars in a just cause. People in need of food and assistance crossed the border from the Guinea Republic into Portuguese Guinea to visit markets and medical posts. Food and help mattered more to these people than "arms supplied by their Government to terrorists who can get nothing but plunder for themselves,” Dr. Salazar said. From the Congo, a daily stream of half-starved men, women and children poured into Angola, their homeland, to bow to the “legitimate authorities” there.

From Goa, taken over from the Portuguese by the Indian armies “with almost universal acclaim,” there were people who ran the highest risks in order to escape to Portugal and find shelter there. “Evidently this will not pre-

vent people responsible for their countries and for the welfare of mankind from continuing to accuse us of terrible acts of colonialism and the oppression of the people of Portuguese Guinea, Angola, Mozambique and even Lisbon," Dr. Salazar said.