HAILE SELASSIE

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21222, 19 September 1940, Page 11

HAILE SELASSIE

ARRIVAL BACK IN AFRICA Haile Selassit., the Emperor who would not admit aeieat even after Italian troops drove him from his African capital, once more has ao African front on which to fight, states the Christian Science Monitor. With British help he has arrived in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, presumably to lead a British-supported campaign against the Italian conqueror who still holds Ethiopia. He has had the satisfaction of seeing the British Government reverse its acquiescence in the Italian conquest, restore him to recognition as monarch of his country and promise the restoration of an independent Ethiopia after the war is over. How many natives of Ethiopia already are fighting to oust the Italians is not yet clear. Unconfirmed reports recently said 200,000 of them were active. Fighting between Ethiopians and Italians has been reported especially fierce in southern Ethiopia. Last September when the country was under severe political pressure, it was reported that bands numbering as many as 2000 and 3000 warriors were doing their best to upset transportation and demoralise the Italian overlords.

Still another potential source of Ethiopian resistance might be uncovered in the native troops, numbering nearly 500 battalions, and including large numbers of Ethiopians. Whether he wins or loses in this fight, the little King of Kings who carried his big umbrella and a plea for help to Geneva four years ago can make one proud boast: Whereas four years ago he was only an exiled monarch pleading in vain for military assistance to regain his throne, he is today a full-fledged ally of a great power. It was four years ago that the League of Nations admitted the failure of its sanctions campaign against Italy and called it off, despite an eloquent plea for help delivered by Haile Selassie in person before the Assembly of the League. Representatives of 52 governments heard him with mixed sympathy and embarrassment. Their sympathy found expression in their refusal to allow a turbulent group of Italians in the gallery to drown out the Emperor’s eloquent plea. Haile Selassie’s return to Africa after four years of exile and nearpoverty at Bath, England, came within a week after Britain again recognised him as the ruler of the rocky country between the Nile headwaters and the Red Sea. The Negus himself, and some of his greatest warriors who shared exile with him, have declared pointedly that they only await arms to set off rebellion against their conquerors. There now are reports that arms will be supplied. But even without British rifles, some of Selassie’s chieftains have said, the hill tribes, thousands strong, are ready to fall upon their Italian overlords with their native spears and knives. Selassie has named a commander-in-chief, one Fitawari Berou, who ieft Jerusalem a month ago to make contact with the tribes. Italy is using Ethiopia as a base for air and land attacks on neighbouring British territory—Kenya Colony, the Sudan, and British Somaliland.