IRISH TRUCE.

Taranaki Daily News, 9 August 1921, Page 5

IRISH TRUCE.

THREAT TO END IT. NON-RELEASE OF PRISONER. RESENTED BY SINN FEIN. By Telegraph —Press Assn —Copyright Received August 8, 5.5 p.m. London, August 8. The Dublin correspondent of the Daily Express says the Dail Eireann Cabinet states authoritatively that if McKeown (a member of the Dail Eireann, who is the only one not released from prison) is not released the truce will be terminated. Telegrams have been exchanged between the Sinn Fein authorities and the British Government, and a special courier has been despatched to Mr. Lloyd George. A prominent member of the Sinn Fein Cabinet says the English Government has taken this opportunity of raising a test case in the most pointed fashion, calling McKeown a convicted murderer. The evidence at the trial did not furnish any reason for describing him as a murderer; on the contrary, members of the Crown forces testified to his chivalry to his foe. The Daily News says it is true that McKeown is the only member of the Dail Eireann who has been convicted of mur- ! der; yet it is impossible to deny that the others now being released could have been ■ charged with murder instead of being : charged with being concerned with ambushes. The point is that the truce and the circumstances under which it was arranged between General Sir Nevi! Macready and the chiefs of the Irish Republican Army involved full recognition of the status of the Republican forces as a combatant army, and the Government’s insistence on their right to hang McKeown is a reversion to the theory of the murder gang in its crudest form. Somebody blundered; there is no time now to enquire who or why, for events may soon be swept beyond the power of our control; but let the blunder be admitted, and the thundercloud will be dispersed. McKeown was sentenced to death on June 14, and the sentence is still unconfirmed.—Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn. London, August 7. Provincial members of the Irish Republican Army are urging the immediate denunciation of the truce, owing to Dublin Castle s detention of McKeon. This new difficulty has apparently been brought about by the decision of the Government to release ail the members of the Dail Eireann who are in custody except McKeown, who was convicted in June of the murder of Inspector McGrath.