CYPRUS
SIR,—In your leading article of February 22, you had stated that the Cyprus brand of terrorism 'arises when a nationalist movement which wins general support from the community is ignored by an occupying power.' This, surely, is correct.
Yet in your footnote reply to Mr. Pamir's letter of March 15 you said : 'At no time have we stated that EOKA is a universally supported nationalist movement. Like all such organisations, it is repre- sentative only of a tiny minority.'
Surely the whole reason why EOKA has been so hard to stamp out is that it represents the forceful side of a general nationalistic movement which, while not necessarily agreeing with its acts of violence, supports its general policies?
If it was 'representative only of a tiny Minority,' then the Government policy of crushing it would be correct. But as it has the nationalist ideas of a large community behind it, then negotiation, not op- pression, is the only way out.—Yours faithfully,
Harper House, Sherborne, Dorset
J. R. P. BRIDGE
[To say that violence invariably arises when a popular nationalist movement is suppressed is not the same as saying that nationalists invariably
approve of terrorism—still less of a particular terrorist organisation like EOKA. One of the Government's most serious mistakes has been in imagining that crushing EOKA will make any difference; violence will merely break out in different forms—as it has already done, in Cyprus. where organised terrorist activity in the country has for some time been less conspicuous than unorganised, but none the less serious, activity in the towns.— Editor, Spectator.]
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