August 8, 1953
GREECE-TURKEY: Rhodes, 7 – The coast guard is continuing its investigation into an incident provoked by Turkish authorities of Makri (Fethiye) against the captain and crew of a Greek patrol boat sent to Turkey to pick up the surviving passengers and crew of an Air France aircraft that had crashed off the Turkish coast nearby. According to testimony by crew members and passengers of the French aircraft who were brought to Rhodes on a Greek ship, the Turkish authorities behaved in a completely aggressive manner with unprecedented barbarity toward the captain and crew of the Greek patrol boat, after they stormed aboard and forced the captain to raise the Turkish flag on the Greek ship, while at the same time the crowd on shore stoned the ship for four hours. The events occurred as follows: At 6.50 a.m. on Tuesday, August 4, the Greek patrol boat anchored (to pick up the passengers and crew of the aircraft) in the port of Makri. As soon as the local harbor master and police chief came aboard, they ordered the captain in no uncertain terms to rectify his mistake in not raising the Turkish flag. The captain then replied that no naval craft ever raised a foreign flag (…). NEW US AMBASSADOR: Washington, 5 – Mr Cavendish Cannon, the former ambassador to Portugal of the United States of America, was sworn in today as the new ambassador to Greece. Mr Cannon, who is a career diplomat, succeeds Mr John Peurifoy.
