GREEK LIBERATION

Greymouth Evening Star, 1 November 1944, Page 2

GREEK LIBERATION

GUERRILLAS’ SUCCESS

LONDON, October 31. Greek guerrillas have liberated a town eight' miles from the frontier of Jugoslavia after ‘destroying the German garrison. The British Forces north of Koziani, aided by GreeH patriots, continue to harass the retreating Germans. ’ The British cruiser Aurora on . Saturday and Sunday again heavily shelled enemy batteries on the island of Milos, north of Crete.

GERMANS AND BULGARIANS RUGBY, October 31.

Except for the region between Salonika and the Jugoslav frontier, all of Greece is free of the Germans. Salonika itself is likely to be recovered soon it, indeed, the Germans have not already quit that important port. I Greece is now completely free of the Bulgarians, who for more than three years massacred, reported and maltreated the population of the north-western provinces. An Athens correspondent says the Greek Ministers M. Porphyrtgenis and M. Lambrianides, who have returned from a tour of Greek Eastern Macedonia and Western Thrace, report that net a single Bulgarian remains in either province. More than 60,000 Greeks were killed by the Bulgarians during their occupation. The Athens Government has is.sued a decree disarming all resistance organisations in Greece, except the Elas and Edes, which will be incorporated into the Regular. Army. Thq decree follows rioting in Athens, last night, between members of the Elas and Right Wing organisations.

BRITISH OFFICERS’ ACTIVITIES. (Rec. 1.5) LONDON, October 31. For two years, ten British officers, some of whom were dropped by parachute and others landed on lonelybeaches in the darkness, have been at "work in the heart of occupied Greece. The “Daily Express” Athens correspondent says that during the two years they contacted with Greek guerrillas in the mountains and led them on a series of raids against German installations. Guerrilla movements, with the officers’ help, grew in strength and it was soon possible for the officers to go almost anywhere in. Greece. They in the last few months even had their own secret air strips under the very eyes of the German Army of occupation. The liaison officers’ first objective in Greece was to do as much damage as possible to German communications. While Rommel was in Africa, Greece became one of his greatest supply bases, consequently on October 1, 1942, three weeks before the Battle of Alamein started, the first British party dropped in Greece. The group was led by a young officer named Myers, now Brigadier Myers, who is a trained sabotage expert. The junior officers with him are now all Colonels. One of these officers, a New Zealander, Colonel Edmunds, told the correspondent how a party blew up Gorgopotamos Bridge, south of Lamia, on the main Salonika-Athens line. Blowing-up this bridge was the group’s first major operation, and it had a tremendous effect in Greece. It seemed to fan the smouldering embers of resistance in the country. New bands formed everywhere in the mountains. Opposition to the Germans increased by leaps and bounds. Myers said: “We dropped arms and supplies to these guerrilla armies, which cleared most of Central Greece. The Germans every time we destroyed a track in the mountains destroyed the whole of the nearest village—burned it down and laid waste the crops.