LENINGRAD RELIEVED

Evening Post, Volume CXXXV, Issue 15, 19 January 1943, Page 5

LENINGRAD RELIEVED

Schlusselburg Taken By

Red Army

LONDON, January 18. Moscow has announced a successful offensive .-.,.0« : : o/i the Leningrad front south of Lake Ladoga. "" Russian troops have broken the blockade of Leningrad and have captured Schlusselburg. : -' The forces at Leningrad have joined hands with '" -"■ those on the Volkhov front to the south-east. The Russian armies are keeping up their steady pressure ~, against the invaders all along the front and are closing in on the German divisions trapped in the pocket west of Stalin- ' "grad. Today's Moscow communique reports the killing of -.:« more than 1000 in that pocket, and says that 850 prisoners were brought in and much booty was captured. -■•■ - The "News Chronicle" reporter says it is not a retreat ;:; ; according to plan, but a defeat according to plan—the Moscow .1... 'plan. The Germans are short of man-power, but they are still :- ~ putting up a stiff resistance, and they have had to abandon .-.:, i enormous quantities of war material. In the northern Caucasus the Germans are also being rolled back by the advancing Russian armies and the Russians 'ii rJhave captured several more places. There was violent fighty Jng outside one of them before it fell to our allies.

•Further north the Russians are .jn^king headway on the Donets front .« ami south of Voronezh.

. -.Several Russian columns are now : .converging on Kamensko, where the -- main north-south railway from Moscow crosses the Donets River. East of the town the Russians are already massing on the river bank at several points. Further north they control the rail--T\vay, now that Millerovo has fallen, for nearly 300 miles up to Voronezh. - • • The offensive in this sector, now five days old, is being carried out so vigo- : rously that the retreating Germans and Hungarians have had no time to make , ,go.od their new positions. They have made desperate counter-attacks, which y ; have cost them heavy casualties. A later Russian communiique reports .-..-- -that Soviet troops have overcome resistance and advanced into the pocket , held by the surrounded German troops "aY Stalingrad. The Russians are pushy ing ahead down the lower Don valley, and in the Simovniki area they are _,-.-approaching the Manych River crossing north-east of Salsk.