EFFORT AT LASTDITCH STAND

Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 271, 11 August 1943, Page 5

EFFORT AT LASTDITCH STAND

Indication In Rome

FASCIST POLICE STILL ACTIVE

(By Telegraph.—Press assd- —Copyright.) (Received August 10, 11.40 p.m,) LONDON, August 10. Marshal Badoglio Is desperately trying to unite the Italian people for a last-ditch stand, says the British United Press correspondent on the Swiss frontier. “To expect that Italy will desert Germany at this crucial moment in the war and trade her national honour for escape from the fighting is an insult,” said Rome radio. “Italy cannot break her bonds. The fact that the greater part of Sicily is in the enemy’s hands is no reason for throwing up the sponge. A war is not lost or won till the last battle is fought, and the last battle in this war is a long way away yet.” The correspondent adds that the '-.joveminent is reported to be bitterly against any peace terms which give Yugoslavia such Adriatic ports as h >ume _ and Trieste; however, Italians are hinting that they would, of coarse, make peace immediately if the Allies would guarantee the territorial integrity of metropolitan Italy. The fact that the Italian people must now know tuat such terms are unacceptable is only .likely to increase the discontent, particularly in the bigger Italian cities. The Milan correspondent of the Swiss newspaper “Die Tat” says it is significant that the 0.V.R.A., the secret lascist police, is still in existence throughout Italy, though the Fascist Party has been disbanded for some time. Underground Opposition.

The Associaled Press correspondent in Switzerland says that the renewed air raids in northern Italy have resulted m increased strikes and underground political opposition. Troops are being used in Genoa to keep the workers at their jobs. A number of imprisoned Leftists at Turin were released in an effort to appease the population. The Socialists are continuing their effort to start a nation-wide general strike. Germany is reported to have agreed to the return home of all the Italian troops who hitherto liave been in the European fortress, says the correspondent. Those in the Balkans and France are already being withdrawn and are being replaced by Germans. The agreement is believed to have been reached during Herr von Ribbentrop’s visit to Rome last week.

The Madrid correspondent of the “Daily Mail” says that Field-Marshal Rommel is reported to have taken four panzer divisions and other reinforcements to Salonika to take over from the Italian garrison the 250-mile defence line in Greece from Yanina, in western Thessaly. to Dcdeagach, on the western tip of the Thracian coast. The Germans, apparently believing that Greece is the Hext Allied objective,, are, building new airfields 'behind this line. _ According to the “Daily Telegraph s Istanbul correspondent, after a Greek patriot force derailed a German troop train between Larissa and Athens 120 dead and wounded were taken from the wreckage and the line was blocked for several days.

DAMAGE AT MILAN

Report From Frontier LONDON, August 9. Two of the industrial suburbs of Milan, namely, San Giovanni and Sesto, have been completely "haraburged” as a result of the R.A.F. raid, says the Berne correspondent of the Stockholm newspaper “Tidningen.” Two hundred people were killed at the Pirelli works alone. The Scalofarini railway station, with several trainloads of German material, was destroyed. Travellers from Italy report that the principal railway station at Genoa was badly damaged in the R.A.F. raid. Rome radio has told the Italian people that they cannot hope for much protection against Allied air attack. It said that because of the way the Axis troops were resisting in Sicily the Allies hao resumed the bombing of cities, which, as it put it, were “undefended, and, unfortunately, at the present, stage of science, could not be defended.”

THREAT BY GERMANS

Message From Badoglio LONDON, August 9. The London correspondent of the New York “P.M.” says that Marshal Badoglio, in a direct message to the United Nations which an emissary carried to a neutral city, warned that if his Government falls Hitler is prepared to establish an Italian puppet Government, using tlie Nazi armed forces to enforce its rule. Badoglio said that the Germans were threatening to takeover the government of Italy, that 10,000 German troops were stationed in Rome, and a German armoured division was standing just outside Rome, in readines to enter, while a third Nazi division was proceeding toward MINISTER~RESIGNS LONDON. August 10. It is learned from Rome that General Badoglio's Minister of the Interior has resigned.