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the aim of seeing it one day fully indigenous in exactly the same way as it is in European countries and elswhere.
But the historical links between Church and State in Portugal and Portuguese territories made it all the more difficult for the White Fathers to implement their policies. As the Superior General, Fr. Theodore van Asten, commented: "Baffled by the persistent silence we felt that in con;c:tence we had no right to allow ourselves to be accounted the accomplices of the official support that appeared to be given to a regime which shrewdly uses the Church to consolidate and ensure in an area within the African continent an anachronistic situation from which there can be no release.
"Deprived as we are of the
means of bringing about proper
clarification of these matters,
our presence in Mozambique can only engender a regrettable confusion in the minds of the people.
"In a country like Mozambique where the regime openly declares itself Catholic and the Protector of the Church and yet uses it for aims that are alien to Christian teaching, a Church which is unable to speak out is the reverse of a witness to its mission."
In Lisbon, the Portuguese Prime Minister Marcell° Caetano launched an attack on what he called the hypocritical campaign against his country and reiterated that Portugal's African policy would continue unchanged.
Speaking in a nation-wide radio and television broadcast Dr. Caetano said Portugal was facing attack "merely because she wished to follow her own road in concord with the wishes of her people."
"Any other road would be catastrophic for Angola and Mozambique, for Southern Africa, for Europe, and in the
BISHOPS' ENGAGEMENTS
B ishop Ellis of Nottingham — Friday Leads Diocesan Pilgrimage to Lourdes.
B ishop Langton Fox of Manleyla — Sunday: Visits Overton. Wednesday: Visits Presteigne Carmel
Btehop Wheeler of Leads — ihursday/Saturday: Society of St. Gregory's Summer School, Keyworth.
last instance for the equilibrium and peace of the world."
Spelling out Portugal's philosophy on Africa he said the policy is, always was, and will continue to be the bringing together of the local peoples, educating them for modern life, assisting them in all ways and integrating them into the society being formed.
Dr. Caetano said that meanwhile the traditional values of the indigenous population must be respected and the transition should not be too sudden.
"What we wish is one single Portuguese society," he said.
In Bonn General Kaulza de Arriaga, Portuguese comanderin-chief in Mozambique, said in a newspaper interview published today that African civilians' had been killed in anti-guerilla operations. But he denied missionaries' reports of a massacre.
The General told the Hamburg conservative paper, Die Welt, that the account of a massacre at a place called Wiriyamu was false. So was the story that the Bishop of Tete had witnessed the extent of the atrocities from the air during a flight in an army helicopter, he said.
"First, there was no massacre," the General was reported to have told thawspaper in Lourenco Marques. "Second Bishops do not ride around in military helicopters. and certainly not during military operations. Third, the Bishop has often flown over his diocese in a civil plane but he has never seen a massacre. Fourth, he has publicly and plainly stated as much."
General Arriaga admitted that there had been cases where civilians had been killed and wounded when the army had been forced to bomb rebel camps established in civilian villages. He also said civilians being used by the rebels as porters had died during attacks on supply columns bringing chinese weapons into Mozambique.
The General said that during 10,000 military operations carried out in the last two-anda-half years only ten cases of excesses had been reported by missionaries, on investigation two cases had been proved and the gulity soldiers punished. he said.