Mr. G. R. Powles to Succeed

High Commissioner Of

W. Samoa

Mr. G. R. Powles to Succeed Colonel Voelcker

THE next High Commissioner of Western Samoa will be Mr. Guy Richardson Powles. He will succeed Lieutenant-Colonel F. W. Voelcker, DSC, MC, who will complete his term next February. The appointment was offici ally announced on September 27 in Well ington, NZ.

Lieutenant-Colonel Voelcker took up the position of Administrator of Western Samoa in February, 1946. and became the first High Commissioner on the coming into force of the Samoa Amendment Act, 1947. He had served with distinction in the New Zealand forces in Fiji. He was appointed to command the Third Bat talion, Fiji Infantry Regiment, in 1942.

The regiment took part in the Solomon Islands campaign in conjunction with United States forces.

MR. POWLES is now counsellor in the New Zealand Legation in Washing ton. He was born in 1905, and graduated bachelor of laws at Victoria University College. He practised as a barrister in Wellington between 1928 and

1940. Enlisting early in the Second World War, Mr. Powles was a brigade major of the Second Brigade Group from 1940 to 1942. He was instructor at the New Zealand Staff College with the rank of lieutenant-colonel from 1942 to 1943, and later joined the Third New Zealand Division in the Pacific as a battery com mander. He was in action with that formation and was in command of a field regiment. From 1944 to 1945 he was Director of Personal Services at Army Headquarters, Wellington.

Mr. Powles has always taken a keen interest in international affairs and was secretary and later president of the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs.

He was appointed to the External Affairs service in December, 1945, and posted to Washington to assist in the work of the Far Eastern Commission. Mr. Powles has been intimately connected with the work of the commission as the New Zealand representative since that time. He at tended the British Commonwealth con

ference on the Japanese peace settle ment in Canberra in 1947. and has rep resented New Zealand at other inter national conferences.

Lieut.-Col. Voelcker,