NIEMEN FORCED

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 180, 1 August 1944, Page 5

NIEMEN FORCED

THREE-DAY BATTLE Russians Break Powerful Nazi Defences N.Z.P.A. and British Wireless Rec. 1 p.m. LONDON, July 31. Marshal Stalin, in an Order of the Day, addressed to General Chernyakhov, states that troops of the Third White Russian Front passed to the offensive and forced the Niernen River, broke powerful defences on the west bank, and in three days' fighting advanced 30 miles, extending the break-through to 145 miles. In the course of the offensive the Russians captured the important railway junction of Marijampilis, besides 1500 other places.

To-night's Soviet communique reports that the Russians have broken into Kaunas and engaged in street fighting. ■ The communique adds that the Russians, west and south-west of Pskov, captured 80 places, and northwest and west of Dvinsk, captured 300 places. West and south-west of Ukmerge, they captured 200 places, while west and south-west of Grodno they captured 100 places. South-west of Przemysl, Russians occupied 60 localities. Troops of the First White Russian Front captured Wolomin, ten miles north-east of Warsaw.

Milestones To Europe As the Soviet armies hurtle forward on a number of fronts they gather strength on others in preparation for new offensives, writes a Moscow correspondent. Red Army units, moving to positions for the final assault on Warsaw, include groups barely 300 miles from Berlin, having come 700 miles from Moscow and 1100 miles from Stalingrad. Warsaw salients are the most advanced points of the great bulge stretching from the Gulf of Finland to the Carpathians. General Govorov's men still advance steadily towards Tallinn, capital of Esthonia. General Chernickhovsky's men, thundering on through Suwalki Land, on the East Prussian border, are 130 miles from Koenigsberg and about 210 from Danzig.

Marshal Rokossovsky's troops are barely 300 miles from Prague, Bratislava and Vienna, while Soviet troops in Rumania are less than 350 miles from Sofia, 200 from Bucharest, and barely 300 from Belgrade.