ITALY’S HUNGRY EYE

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 982, 27 May 1930, Page 9

ITALY’S HUNGRY EYE

FOCUSSED ON MALTA, SO MINISTER SAYS

RELIGION OVERLAPS POLITICS

: United P.A. —By Telegraph—Copyright Reed. 1.5 p.m. LONDON, Monday. “Speaking with full responsibility, | I say there is not a shadow of doubt j that Italy has cast the hungriest eyes | on Malta. If the oft-mentioned scheme of the revival of the old Roman Emj pire means anything, Malta is designed to be the pivot,” said Sir Augustus Bar- | tolo, the Maltese Minister of EducaI tion.and the premier, Lord Strickland’s ! deputy, when interviewed in London. I He added that the present diffiI culties were political and not religious, but the ecclesiastical authorities were undoubtedly helping the Nationalists. “We only claim to take our religion from Rome, and our politics from ourselves.”

KEEPS ITALY AWAKE MUSSOLINI TALKS OF WAR AND REVOLUTION ROME, Sunday. Scenes similar to those which marked the reception given to the Prime Minister, Signor Mussolini, at Florence, were repeated at Milan during the celebration of the 15th anniversary of Italy’s intervention in the Great War.

It is estimated that 200,000 people were present when Signor Mussolini mounted a rostrum on the piazza outside Milan Cathedral. The streets, windows and roofs were black tvith spectators and even the gargoyles on the Cathedral were festooned with humanity. The Prime Minister said his hearers would not expect him to supplement his Florence speech upon wTiich he had meditated for a long time before it was delivered. He had made that speech for the purpose of not allowing the Italian people to be “lulled to sleep by the bleating of sheep which really are wolves.” To those who accused him of not behaving in Ministerial style Signor Mussolini retorted that Fascism was revolution. “I am the head and creator of the insurrection,” he declared.