THE DODECANESUS [To Me Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
Sta,—Although, as you state in the Spectator, the Greek islands of the Aegean called the Dodecanesus were by special treaty made over to Greece, in the so-called Tittoni-Venizelos agreement in 1920, this convention was never carried out. After the collapse of the. Greeks in Asia Minor, and the non- ratification of the Treaty of Sevres, Italy refused to honour her signature, and has since annexed the islands.
A decree published last year obliged the inhabitants either to assume Italian nationality or depart from their homes. Many thousands of Dodecanesians preferred exile in Greece to abandoning their Greek nationality. For years past the Italian Government has pursued a policy of Itaha' nization of these islands, often accompanied by very ruthless methods.
A systematic attack on the Greek national Church, the Greek language through the schools, and on Greek institutions gen- erally has been launched by the Italian authorities in order to change the Greek character of these islands.
The Greeks have been deprived of the means of supporting
their own schools, and the few private local schools left to them will not bear the stamp of the public schools ; therefore, it will be difficult for them to compete with the Italian public schools now opened everywhere. This is a great blow to the Greeks who retained their national existence through their schools, language and church. Against this persecution the inhabitants are holding out as resolutely as they can, as they are determined not to become anything else but Greek. To their Greek heritage of language, culture and religion they cling with a fierce tenacity, even though it may mean long years of struggle to come.
Meanwhile the property of the exiles (who are being sup-
ported by public subscription in Greece) is being confiscated and given to Italian settlers, so that in process of time the islands will no longer contain the predominance of a Greek population in islands which have been since antiquity the cradle of their race and civilization. A more unjust state of things can scarcely be imagined, and should not be allowed
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