U.S.A. To Send Man To Vietnam

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30976, 4 February 1966, Page 14

U.S.A. To Send Man To Vietnam

(New Zealand Press Association) Wellington, February 3. Mr W. Herewini, a senior Wellington public servant, leaves for Vietnam on February 8 as a representative of the New Zealand Returned Services’ Association.

Announcing this today, the Dominion president of the N.Z.R.S.A., Mr Hamilton Mitchell, said the visit was to get first-hand knowledge of the needs of Naval, Army and Air Force personnel that could be met by the association.

The Minister of Defence (Mr Eyre) had allowed Mr Herewini to travel by service aircraft.

“This gesture would be deeply appreciated by all returned servicemen,” Mr Mitchell said. Mr Herewini is Controller of Maori Welfare in the Department of Maori Affairs. He represented the New Zea-

land Government at the seminar on urban community development organised by E.C.A.F.E. in Singapore in 1962. He was a foundation member of the 28th Maori Battalion in 1940, and served in the Middle East. Mr Herewini was taken prisoner by the Germans in Greece in April, 1941, and released four years later when the United States Army overran his prisoner-of-war camp at Mossburg. Two representatives of the Returned Services’ League in Australia will make a similar visit to Australian troops in South-east Asia.