SINN FEIN’S REIGN OF TERROR

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 176, 21 April 1921, Page 5

SINN FEIN’S REIGN OF TERROR

MR. LLOYD GEORGE DEFENDS POLICfe

UNCHECKED VIOLENCE NOT

CONDONED

By Telegraph—Press Association-Copyright. (Rec. April 20, 5.5 p.m.) London April 19.

Mr. Lloyd George, in a long letter in reply to the Bishops and other churchmen who wrote condemning the reprisals by tho Crown forces, says: "It is utterly untrue that there had been any authorisation or condonation of the policy of meeting murder by unchecked violence. Acts of indiscipline are now’ increasingly infrequent. The general record of patience and endurance displayed by the sorely tried police will command admiration by posterity, Tho Sinn Fein inaugurated a reign of terror, and murdered its opponents ruthlessly. The present quarrel is not about tho Home Rule Act, but secession. The Government will never give way on this fundamental point. To abaiidon the use of force would be to surrender to violence, crime, and separation. That I am not prepared to do.” —Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn. FIGHT WiriFREBELS London, April 19. A report from headquarters in Dublin states that a patrol surprised civilians drilling at Ballymurphy. An engagement followed, aaid five rebels were killed, two wounded, and six captured unwounded. Tho Crown forces had no casualties. —Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn. THE INTERVIEW WITH ARCHBISHOP MANNIX REMARKS ASCRIBED TO POPE DENIED. London, April 19. Archbishop Mannix, referring to the reported Paris interview, denies that he said tho Pope had described tho British policy in Ireland as shocking.—Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn.