FOUR FREEDOMS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 16 June 1942, Page 3

FOUR FREEDOMS

FAITH OF THE UNITED NATIONS DECLARED BY PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT. MR CHURCHILL’S MESSAGE. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, June 14. President Kooscvelt, in his United Nations Day broadcast in the United States, said: “The belie! in the four freedoms and in common humanity, the belief in man being created free and in the image of God is the crucial difference between ourselves and the enemies we face. In this lies the absolute unity of our alliance. Here is our strength, the source and promise of victory. “We ask the Germans whether they would rather have the mechanised hell of Hitler’s new order or freedom of speech and religion, freedom from want and from tear. "We ask the Japanese whether they would rather continue in slavery and blood, or, in place of them, have the four freedoms. “We ask the brave unconquered people of the nations which the Axis invaders have despoiled and dishonoured whether they would rather yield to their conquerors or have the four freedoms. We know the answer. We know that man, born to freedom and in the image of God, will not forever suffer the oppressors’ sword. “The people of the United Nations are taking that sword from the oppressors’ hands. With it they will destroy the tyrants.” In the Soviet Union the public institutions flew colours in honour of the United Nations. The central Government newspaper “Izvestia,” in an editorial, said: “The enemy, who lashes at us with the fury of a mad dog sensing His doom, is not yet smashed, but he is doomed.” Mr Churchill, in a message for the day, stated: “I join my voice to Mr Roosevelt’s in honouring today the forces of the United Nations. Let us pay this tribute to the •valour and sacrifice of those who have fallen and to the courage and endurance of those who fight today. Let us remember that everyone, man, woman and child, who is in the oppressed and tortured countries works for the day of liberation that is coming. In this ceremony we pledge each to the other not merely support and succour till victory comes, but that wider understanding, that quickened sense of human sympathy, that recognition of common purpose without which the suffering and striving of the United Nations will not achieve its full reward.” Speaking of the United Nations, he said: “Apart from the United Kingdom, these are the people whose names today make up that great roll of honour:—The United States, Russia, China. Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Belgium, Costa Rica, Cuba, Czechoslovakia, the Dominican Republic, Salvador, Free France, Greece, India. Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Luxemburg, Mexico, the Netherlands, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Poland, and Yugoslavia.”