IRISH AFFAIRS.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume XI, Issue 3538, 28 July 1920, Page 5

IRISH AFFAIRS.

NEW PHASE OF SINN FEIN CAMPAIGN. LONDON. July 26. A new phase of the Sinn Fein campaign has been entered upon. Twenty masked men held up three police returning from church at Streamstown, Meath, stripped- them of their uniforms and left them naked on the roadside. The Sinn Feiners, dressed in the uniforms, gained admittance to the police barracks and tried to carry it by assault by means of rifle fire, but the police were on the alert and repulsed the surprise attack. A taxi-driver named David Dunbar, ignoring a challenge, wag shot dead by a sentry in Belfast.

TURNING AGAINST THE SINN FEIN. LONDON, July 27. Five disguised men entered a timber yard in Bantry, County Cork, and set fire to the yard and adjoining flour stores, which were completely destroyed. The damage is estimated at £40,000. It is believed to be the action of opponents of the Sinn Fein_ Another anti-Sinn Fein fire occurred in drapery stores in Ballylanders. No jurors attended Mulhern’s inquest at Bandon and the inquiry was abandoned. Reprisals for the outrage are feared.

An encounter between raiders and police at Lixnaw, County Kerry, resulted in four policemen being dangerously wounded.

NO RELIGIOUS DISTINCTION

Received 8.40. LONDON, July 26. In rbe He use of Commons, in reply to a motion by Mr. Devlin for the adjournment to call attention to "events In Belfast and the failure of the Government to protect Catholics, Sir Hainan Greenwood said the soldiers and police would deni 1 with the mobs, whether Protestant or Catholic, exactly alike. There were five battalions of infantry in Belfast and three others available if required. Warships were nearby and there were 1156 police. The Government had done everything possible and had prevented one ofTho greatest catastrophies that could have befallen Ireland, in the shape of the massacre of thousands, and a devastating civil war. He emphatically refuted the suggestion . that reprisals seem to be any part of the Government’s policy. The police and military had shown the sternest, impartiality.