COMMUNIQUE

Press, Volume LXXX, Issue 24445, 20 December 1944, Page 5

COMMUNIQUE

(Rec. 1.45 a.m.) LONDON. Dec. 19. To-days communique from Supreme Allied Headquarters says:— “Heavy fighting continues in the sectors where the enemy launched his attacks between the Monschau area and the southern part of the German-Luxemburg border. "Our forces in the Linnich area (north-east of Aachen) are mopping up in Wurm and Nullendorf. “In the Dillingen and Saarlouis bridgeheads (in the Saar) our forces continued to make slow progress in wiping out enemy strongpoints, North-east of Sarreguemines we have reached a wooded area one mile from Habkirchen. We have also made gains in the vicinity Walsheim and Medelsheim, nine miles east of Sarreguemines. In the vicinity of Bitsche we have taken a large portion of two stubbornly-defended Maginot fortifications. “We have advanced two miles north of Wissembourg (in the sector across the Rhine from Karlsruhe) and have entered the German villages of and Schlettenback, which are respectively eight and six miles north-west of Wissembourg and are both two and a half miles from the frontier. Farther heavy fire was received from the Siegfried Line. "Stiff fighting continues north-west of Colmar. We have made further limited advances in the High Vosges mountains.”