BACK IN SYDNEY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21958, 15 November 1934, Page 11

BACK IN SYDNEY

PROHIBITED PREVIOUSLY CASE OF GERALD GRIFFIN (Received November 15, 12.45 a.m.) SYDNEY, Nov. 14 The Customs authorities in, Sydney are diligently searching for a man named Griffin, who is alleged to have arrived in Sydney from New Zealand under an assumed name last Monday. He was prohibited from entering the Commonwealth about a fortnight ago and wis shipped back to New Zealand. '**■

The customs officials say he disguised his appearance .by using horn-rimmed glasses, but his baggage is being detained.

A man purporting to be Griffin tonight gave press representatives an interview which is to be published in the morning. He threatens to take legal action against the Commonwealth and says he is determined to see his mission through at the Anti-War Congress in Melbourne.

Press Association message from Wellington on November 6 stated:-—'

"I am that Dutchman," said Gerald Griffin, of Wellington, native of .Ireland, and a 'British subject, who returned from Sydney to-day, as he reporter a clipping of a press cablegram to New Zealand stating that a Dutch passenger, who arrived at Sydney by the Monowai, had been shipped back to New Zealand by the Marama because he failed to pass the dictation test in Dutch. * Griffin said he knew nothing of Dutch and could not be expected to know it, but surmised that advantage was being; taken of some technicality of Australian law to exclude him. He was asked no questions beyond his name,' even though, he suggested that he Was being confused with another person. Griffin did not set foot on Australian soil, but was taken across the Union Company's wharf from one steamer to the other between the Monowai's arrival and the Marama'? departure an hour later. , "My main object in visiting Australia was to attend the forthcoming all-Australia congress against war," he r said. " I am national secretary of the New Zealand movement against war and Fascism, and was to have attended on behalf of that body: It is not a Communist organisation, and one of the leading iigures in the Australian " movement is Bishop Burgman, of New South Wales. I am not a member of the Communist party."