IRISH REPUBLICANS

New Zealand Times, Volume L, Issue 11437, 6 February 1923, Page 5

IRISH REPUBLICANS

1)E VALERA IX HIDING EXPRESSES HIS DETERMINATION. “LLOYD GEORGE A TYRANT.” By Telegraph.—Press Assn.- -Copyright. Australian and N.Z. Cable Association. LONDON. February 4. “A peace based on the so-called Treaty is impossible. The Republicans will never consent to surrender national independence and sovereignty to threats. They will fight to the last against recognition of foreign authority, direct or indirect.’’ This is the considered opinion of Mr Kamon De Valera, obtained by a “Daily Hail” correspondent after a journey to De Valera’s secret hidingplace. “I could not, if I would, disclose his whereabouts,” the correspondent says. “I know it cannot be far from the heart of Dublin. The car journey took barely a half-hour fro mthe rendezvous in one of Dublin’s busiest streets. “A CHARMING WOMAN.”

“Tlie appointment resulted in the nrriv al of a car driven by a most charming young woman, who intimated that she was appointed to take the correspondent to meet ‘Mr Bourke.’ Tho limousine twisted and turned into side streets, travelled strange thoroughfares, crossed the water twice, and drew up in a street of old substantial houses. The guide knocked with peculiar emphasis on the door, which was opened by a woman in evening dress who lead me through a handsome hall up softly-carpeted stairs to a drawingroom, where I found Mr De Valera.” “The Irish Government,” he declared, “must be determined by the people, and not dictated from the outside. We in arms are now losieting exactly what the nation iesisted from 1919 to 1921. The onlv difference is that England then was maintaining her .claims directly; now she is maintaining them through Irishmen. ' “This is a continuance of the former fight against foreign aggression. Lloyd George and his colleagues bullied Hie delegates into signing the Treaty. ENGLAND WILL REGRET. “Remove outside threats of coercion and we could have peace within a day,but, if England continues to refuse, she cannot ri dherself of the responsibility. Lloyd George played the part o fa tyrant. If the Free State i ever functions, it will be over the bodies of the Republicans. England will have cause to regret her mistake. The new Ireland will remember her wrong B in the hour of England’s difficulty. A brother who has killed a brother soonsr than have a sister surrender will remember who caused him to brand himself with the mar kof Cain.” Had De Valera been in the position of the Free Staters, he said, he would have drawn the line at war in order to compel acquiescence. He would not have put to death men like Brugha, Boland, Childers, Mellowes, and O’Connor. He would have told England that he had made a mad mistake, and could not do what he thought could he done. FREE STATE DOOMED. The Republican Government, he added, was functioning. It was collecting a revenue and organising an army. The Free State was doomed. It was alive only in the cities and towns. Replying to a question as to what would happen to the Free State leader®, if the Republic-us triumphed, Do Valera stated that he hoped that the Government of the Republic would be wise enough not to be tempted into the path which the Free Staters had followed. THE REPLY QUIXORTIC DE VALERA. In replying to the De' Valera interview, Mr Kevin O’Higgins, Minister for Home Affairs, says: “We have reached a stage when the grimmest decisions have to be taken, if organised sabotage continues. .De Valera is like his compatriot Don Quixote. He is tilting at windmills. The people acting with him in the criminal conspiracy against the life of the Irish nation cannot complain if tho nation, in selfdefence, deals with them summarily and ruthlessly.”