FLAG STILL FLYING

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20275, 17 June 1940, Page 6

FLAG STILL FLYING

MESSAGE TO NORWAY BROADCAST BY KING PATRIOTISM UNDIMMED (British Official Wireless.) Reed, noon RUGBY, June 16. King Haakon, referring in a broadcast speech in the Norwegian news talk to-night to developments in northern Norway which made further fighting impossible, with the result that he was obliged to take the sad step of leaving the country, said: “I hope and trust that everybody will understand what a struggle it was for me to take such a decision and leave the country in which for 35 years I have lived and come to be a member of the people and in which I lived happily. At this moment, when the Norwegian people are suffering and writhing under tTie oppressor’s heel, I would have preferred to stop in the country and share these grim times with my people.” The King added that from his new place of residence he and the Norwegian Government would “watch over that considerable part of Norway which is still free, namely our merchant fleet, and see to it that the Norwegian flag shall still be flying in every sea. It is a great comfort to me that I can in this way, even outside Norway, work for my people and my country." King Haakon concluded: “We are fighting an enemy who does not understand us and who Ms no idea of the firmly-established patriotism which lives in the hearts of all Norwegians, winch inspires us who are now exiles to work more than ever before. It is absolutely unthinkable for us that we should not be able one day to continue our lives in a Norway in which we can control our own fate.”