VALIANT CZECHS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 October 1940, Page 3

VALIANT CZECHS

MR CHURCHILL’S MESSAGE OF HOPE ON SECOND ANNIVERSARY OF MUNICH. STRUGGLE SHALL NOT BE IN VAIN. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, September 30. In a message to the Czechoslovak people broadcast today, the Prime Minister, Mr Churchill, said: “Today is the second anniversary of the Munich Agreement, a date which the world will always remember for the tragic sacrifice made by the Czechoslovak people in the interest of ’ European peace. “The hopes that this agreement stirred in the heart of civilised mankind have been frustrated. Within six months the solemn pledge given by the unscrupulous men who control the destiny of Germany was broken and the agreement destroyed with a ruthlessness which unmasked the true nature of their reckless ambitions to the whole world. 1 “The protection which Hitler forced upon you has been a sham and a cloak for the incorporation of your once flourishing country in the sb-called greater Reich. Instead of protection he has brought you nothing but moral and material devastation, and today the followers of that great, tolerant humanitarian, President Masaryk, are being persecuted with a deliberate cruelty which has few parallels in modern history. HOUR OF MARTYRDOM. “In this hour of your martyrdom I send you this message: The battle which" we in Britain are fighting today is not only our battle. It is also your battle, indeed the battle of all nations who prefer liberty to soulless serfdom. It is a struggle by civilised nations for the right to live their own lives in the manner of their own chqosing. It represents man’s instinctive defiance of tyranny. “Throughout history no European nation has shown greater will to survive than yours, and again today your people have given countless proofs of their courage in adversity. Here in Britain we have welcomed with pride and gratitude your soldiers and airmen who have come, by ddring escapes, to take part with ever-increasing success in that battle for freedom which is also the battle of Czechoslovakia. , . “No less sincere is our admiration of those Czechs who on the home front are risking death and worse than death in order to foster resistance against the cruel and heartless oppressor. It is because we are both fighting for the fundamental decencies of human life that we are determined that neither our struggle nor your struggle shall be in vain. “It is for this reason that we have refused to recognise any of the brutal conquests _of Germany in Central Europe ancT elsewhere, that we have welcomed the Czechoslovak Provisional Government in this country, and (hat, the restoration of Czechoslovak liberties is' one of pur principal war aims. With firmness and resolution, two qualities which our nations share in equal measure, these aims will be achieved. Be of good cheer. The hour of your deliverance will come, for the soul of freedom is deathless. It cannot and will not perish.”