RED ARMY WITHIN SIGHT OF ROSTOV

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 31, 6 February 1943, Page 5

RED ARMY WITHIN SIGHT OF ROSTOV

(New Zealand Press Association.—Copyright.—Rec. 1 p.m.) LONDON, February 5. General Yeremenko's armoured divisions this morning stormed Bataisk, the last big town before Rostov south of the Don on the Baku-Rostov railway. They are this evening sweeping the broken remnants of von List's army across the frozen marshes towards Rostov, the houses of which are visible to the Russians now five or six miles away. The Daily Telegraph's Stockholm correspondent reports this in a late dispatch to-night. He adds that Russian artillery and dive bombers are blasting the roads on the outskirts of Rostov, where the main German army is withdrawing to Taganrog. The Russians have now completed the separation of von List's army groups of the Kuban steppes and the southern Don. The Red armies are smashing down the Baku-Rostov railway and are reported to have reached the Sea of Azov, at the head of Beisugski Bay, where the capture of Brynkovsk is expected hourly. This advance, after the capture of Minskaya and Bataisk closes the last German escape "hatch" to the north. m addition Novorossisk, the Germans' main port for the supply of the Caucasus is almost constantly under bombardment from the Russian Black Sea Fleet and bombs from the Red Air Force, whose fighter escorts are unquestionably superior to the Luftwaffe. Russian marines, supported by guns from warships, are firmly established ashore, where a savage battle is progressing despite German claims to have annihilated the naval units. Moscow reports suggest that if the navy manages to reinforce the land units the operation may menace all of von List's eventual line of retreat to Kerch across the Taman Peninsula by way of Temryuk.