Why Pacific Territories Association

Should be Supported

(From a correspondent who attended

the general meeting on September 30)

FROM the observer’s point of view, the Association, especially the executive, appear to be doing an excellent job. The Pacific war has robbed —for the moment, anyhow—residents of Papua and New Guinea of everything, and whether that loss is to be temporary or permanent is largely up to the residents themselves. N.ow is the time to fight, and in view of this it seems unfortunate that the membership is not larger than it is.

The Association naturally is concerned with evacuees’ problems primarily, but the larger issues at stake have not been lost sight of. Probably these people rea lise, better than the average Australian, just what war and invasion mean, and what the men who are now fighting in Papua are going through.

In order to safeguard the interests and rights of the Papuan and New Guinea men who are the backbone of the mili tary forces in that area—men who, ex- Territorians know only too well, from hard experience of the country, are going through undiluted hell —and for the civi lians who were compulsorily evacuated from the Territories to which they had given their best years, it is urged that now is the time for all, who can, to unite and pull together.

Rev. R. S. Brown, of the Methodist Overseas Mission, has completed a six weeks’ tour of Queensland as Overseas Mission Deputation. Mr. Brown escaped from New Guinea at the end of March.