BRITISH ANNOUNCER

Wairarapa Times-Age, 14 August 1942, Page 4

BRITISH ANNOUNCER

VOICE HEARD IN TOKIO BROADCASTS.

BELIEVED TO BE ACTING UNDER DURESS.

(Special Australian Correspondent.) SYDNEY, August 13.

A former Sydney radio announcer who was taken prisoner after the fighting in Malaya is believed to be broadcasting the English news commentaries from Tokio He is Captain Charles Cousens, formerly chief announcer of station 2GB, Sydney. Military investigators believe the broadcasts are being made under duress.

Mrs Cousens has identified the voice as that of her husband and the identification has been confirmed by other investigators. She describes the broadcasts as “terrible and tragic.” Former broadcasting associates of Cousens describe his voice as “colourless, flat and sick,” and quite different from his normal broadcasting voice. They believe he has been tortured or, confronted with evidence of Japanese atrocities and hoping that he might be able to ease the lot of his fellow-pri-soners, has at last consented to go oh the air. Cousens, who comes from an English military family, was a graduate of Sandhurst Military College and saw service in the Khyber Pass, where he was decorated . His father holds the rank of colonel. One brother is interned in Turkey, another is missing after R.A.F. operations, and a third is on service in Abyssinia. The Minister of Information, Senator Ashley, said today that investigations indictated that Cousens was broadcasting direct from Tokio. Investigators were of the opinion that the broadcasts were being made under duress. The voice has been heard on the ah’ several times during the past fortnight at 9.15 p.m. New Zealand time and again at 12.15 a.m.