PUBLICATION STOPPED

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25513, 18 April 1944, Page 3

PUBLICATION STOPPED

TWO SYDNEY NEWSPAPERS ALLEGED CENSORSHIP BREACH SYDNEY, Apl. 17. Neither the Sydney Morning Herald nor the Sydney Daily Telegraph was on sale this morning. Distribution of the papers was prevented by the Commonwealth officer following the publication of material which they had been ordered by the Commonwealth Publicity Censorship not to publish. The action followed the prevention of the distribution of the Sunday Telegraph yesterday. This suppression, came as the result of a refusal on the part of the Sunday Telegraph to comply with censorship instructions ordering the editor to fill in certain blank spaces from which matter had been deleted by the censor. This action was the culmination of differences between the Minister for Information (Mr A. A. Calwell),. who controls the censorship, and the chairman of the Australian Newspaper Proprietors’ Association (Mr R. A. Henderson). Last Wednesday Mr Calwell defended the Information Department against earlier newspaper criticism which followed misunderstandings created in the United States by the Ministerial announcement of the pending reduction in the strength of the Australian Army. The initial censorship action concerned a reply made to the Minister by Mr Henderson on behalf of the Newspaper Proprietors’ Association. It is understood that suppression of to-day’s Sydney morning newspapers followed their failure to comply with an order not to publish material arising out of the same matter. Legal action Is believed to be pending.