BYELGOROD FALLS TO RUSSIAN ARMY

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 34, 10 February 1943, Page 3

BYELGOROD FALLS TO RUSSIAN ARMY

(New Zealand Press Association.—Copyright. —Rec. 1 p.m.) LONDON, February 9. The Russians have captured Byelgorod. about 45 miles north of Kharkov, and are battering at the gates of Rostov and Kharkov. To-night's special Moscow communique states that the Russians, commanded by Lieutenant-General Moskalenko, after stubborn fighting, occupied the town and rail junction of Byelgorod, also the town of Shebekino, 1 8 miles south-east of Byelgorod. Reuters Moscow correspondent says the deadly 76-milli-metre guns which ground Field-Marshal Paulus" Stalingrad army to powder are now pounding Rostov suburbs, stretching for 20 miles along the north bank of the mile-wide Don River. The Russians have captured a village at the approaches to the city. The Stockholm correspondent of the Daily Express says that Russian siege guns have begun shelling the German positions extending many miles around Kharkov. Stormoviks are blitzing the roads and railways to prevent reinforcements coming in. and are preparing the way for the assault, for which five Russian columns are massing, some only 20 miles distant from the city. The Russians are simultaneously menacing Orel and Bryansk.