GLEAM OF HOPE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 December 1938, Page 7

GLEAM OF HOPE

SEEN BY SOUTH AFRICAN MINISTER MR CHAMBERLAIN'S EFFORTS FOR PEACE. ) APPRECIATION AND SYMPATHY. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY. December 8. The following statement was issued on behalf of the South African Minister of Defence, Mr Pirow. from South Africa House tonight: "On the eve of my departure for South Africa I want to thank the British Government for the generous way it has assisted us in our defence requirements. This sympathetic attitude is all the more appreciated because we realize how deeply Britain is concerned with her own rearmament programme. "In spite of the correction administered to my views by a section of the Press—which apparently does not appreciate the value of an international settlement of the refugee question as a hopeful approach to European appeasement —1 leave Europe with a feeling of almost unqualified anxiety. "One gleam of hope to my mind is Ihe fact that Mr Chamberlain will spare no effort to secure a lasting basis for peace. His phenomenal success in Munich encourages one to believe he may also save the present situation. “At the same time it must be accepted that he has made all the advances which can reasonably be expected and a gesture should now come from one or more of the other parties to the Munich agreement.

"In any case, his efforts in the direction of international understanding will nowhere be watched with more appreciation and sympathy than in South Africa.”

Mr Pirow and Mrs Pirow lunched with the King and Queen at Buckingham Palace.

A Press Association report says Mr Pirow declared that nowhere had he discovered a desire to regard the colonies question as urgent.