RUSSIAN PROGRESS IN NORTH POLAND.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVI, Issue 65, 17 March 1915, Page 5

RUSSIAN PROGRESS IN NORTH POLAND.

ENEMY THROWN BACK IN EAST GALICIA.

TERRIBLE LOSSES TO BOTH SIDES IN WINTER CAMPAIGN.

LONDON, March 10. It is officially annouced in Petrograd that the Russians have made progress along the whole Prasnysz front, in North Poland, from the Mlawa railway to the Orjiec River. German counter-attacks were everywhere repulsed. The guns of the Osowiec fortress wrecked several of the enemy's heavy calibre siege batteries. In the Carpathians, Austrian attacks were directed at Baligrod. A German attack ne»x Kosziowa was repulsed. In East Galicia the enemy was thrown back in the region of North Obertyn. The Paris "Journal" states that there is every indication of the concentration of eight German army corps in the Prasnysz region. Tbe Germans dragged heavy guns into position before Osowiec. in North Poland, and unsuccessfully endeavoured to dispel a mobile force before the fortress. During the winter the losses on both sides have been terrible. The Russian and German lines in the Prasnysz region, north of Warsaw are so close together that large masses of troops are unable to move freely. A report from Copenhagen says that many Austrian prisoners in the Carpathians have been shot in the back, showing the manner in which their officers encouraged their advance. It is reported that Germans, in the neighbourhood of Sieradz, in Southwest Poland, have commenced to build a strategic railway, using the forced labour of thousands of people from the Polish villages. The capture of Malkowice. in Galicia. has enabled the Russian forces to approach close to the outworks of Przemysl. and the bombardment of the fortress has begun. An Austrian communique states:-We repulsed the Russians in the Opor Valley and took thousands of prisoners. We drove back Russians north of tbe Uszok Pass along tha entire front.