PARTISAN GAINS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 62, 14 March 1944, Page 5

PARTISAN GAINS

Capture Of Town On Island Off Yugoslav Mainland MERCURY MINE DESTROYED British Official Wireless Rec. 1.30 p.m. RUGBY, Mar. 13. Yugoslav Partisan headquarters reports that on the island of Brae a Partisan detachment, commanded by an American officer, has captured Pucisce, on the coast facing the mainland 18 miles south-east of Split, and 25 miles north-west of the Neretva Channel. On the island of Hvar, however, the Partisans are engaged in heavy fighting against superior forces. Heavy fighting around Ljubljana, Novomesto and Kocevje, in Slovenia, is reported.

So far, it is estimated in London, the Germans have managed to keep strongly escorted trains running on the main lines between Trieste, Fiume, Ljubljana and Zagreb. Both east and west of Ljubljana, however, the Partisans are firmly established in the mountainous regions. They control most of the interior of the triangle of Zagreb, Ljubljana and Fiume, and the parallelogram athwart the Italian frontier.

Perhaps the Partisans' most striking achievement in the westernmost of the two areas was the temporary capture and destruction of the mercury mine at Irdia, 20 miles east of Gorizia. This produces a quarter of the Italian output of mercury which, before the war, was 43 per cent of the world output.

The explanation of the Yugoslav Partisans success in holding a large area inside the Italian frontier is, of course, _ that nearly all the rural population east of the River Isonzo, is Slovene not Italian.