FREED FROM AXIS

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 134, 4 December 1944, Page 5

FREED FROM AXIS

VIRTUALLY WHOLE OF CRETE

LONDON, December I. The whole of Crete has now been freed, with the exception of one small c^-aer around Suda > Bay, Canea, and Malerni •- airfield,: says - Reuters correspondent at guerrilla headquarters near.Suda Bay. Ten thousand Germans and 5000 Italian Fascists, under the command of Colonel Bendak, are cut off in this corner without hope1 of escape or rescue.

The battle for the island was fought and lost in this area 3J'years.ago. The enemy has concentrated behind a 30----mile perimeter around Maleka peninsula probably more than 500 field pieces, coastal and anti-aircraft artillery, in addition to ample supplies of food, ammunition, and petrol carefully dispersed in deep rock caves. Twice within the last month the Axis Jias Tejected proposals that they should surrender. . '

The correspondent of the Associated Press says that Cretan guerrillas were trained and armed by British officers, and that the Britishers fighting with, the guerrillas include: Major (Paddy) Lee Fermour, D.5.0., 0J8.E., who cap-. tured General Hehmch Kreipe, commander of the Twenty-second Panzer -Grenadier Division, last April, and Capj tain William Stanley Moss, of the Coldstream Guards.

These officers infiltrated from the mainland three years ago and have been living in caves, jnaking .contact with the guerrillas, forming bands, and arranging for the shipment of arms from $he Middle East.