GREEK BORDER

Greymouth Evening Star, 16 September 1946, Page 5

GREEK BORDER

ATTACKS BY ALBANIANS FACILITATING ENTRY OF ■ BANDITS REPULSED BY TROOPS (Rec. 2 p.m.) LONDON, Sept. 15. Albanian soldiers are reported to have attacked four Greek frontier posts on the Ghinokastro-Janina road, says the Exchange Telegraph’s Athens correspondent. The attacks were repulsed. Two other clashes occurred. The correspondent adds that it is, contended in Athens that the attacks were made for the purpose of facilitating the entry of bandits to Greek territory. A Left Wing band, which attacked Ihe Greek village of Levadi succeeded in occupying the village, says The Times Athens correspondent. The defenders battled for five hours before they were overcome. Strong Greek army formations have moved to encircle the band. COMMUNISTS ‘4IAVE DECLARED WAR” ATHENS, Sept. 14. The Prime Minister (Mr. Tsaldaris) told a Greek correspondent in Paris: , “Since the Communists have declared war, we shall fight too. If they capitulate, we will discuss terms.” The Press Ministry announced that members of the ELAS organisation who took refuge in Jugoslavia in 1944, have been regrouped in Jugoslav labour camps and trained, and now are gathering near Devdelija, a few kilometres north of the border, preparing to move into Greece. Meanwhile, Greek troops and gendarmerie have begun a large-scale mopping up against “300 armed Communists entrenched in a forest behind three minefields on the Chalcidice Peninsula, south of Salonika.” Greek troops in this operation have disposed of “the greatest arms and ammunition dump established by ELAS in northern Greece.” The editor and four assistants of the Left Wing paper “Laiki Foni,” at Salonika, were sentenced to imprisonment, and the paper, was suspended for a year by a military court. They were found guilty of publishing an article criticising the establishment of military courts. Mr. Zachariades, general secretary of the Greek Communist Party, will be tried on October 25 on a charge of making a pre-election speech at Salonika last March considered to be an “instigation against public order.” It is officially announced that a Communist band ambushed and killed the commandant and 13 gendarmes at Veria, in western Macedonia. Four gendarmes were wounded. One British soldier was killed and one was wounded when the vehicle in which they ■ were travelling was ambushed and fired on near Naoussa, in western Macedonia. It is believed the assailants mistook the vehicle for that of the chief of gendarmerie.

ALBANIAN DEMAND FOR UNO ACTION NEW YORK, Sept. 13. The United Nations’ SecretaryGeneral (Mr. Trygve Lie) received a telegram from the Albanian Minister of Foreign Affairs (LieutenantGeneral T. Kocix) urging the Security Council to take action immediately to prevent “armed conflict between Albania and Greece.” The telegram charged the Greek Government with aiming to provoke armed conflict against Albania “to enable Greece to occupy and annex southern Albania under the pretext that it is part of Epirus.” Because of the indisposition of the United States delegate (Mr Derschel Johnson), the United Nations Security Council meeting today was postponed until Monday. In Athens the Deputy-Prime Minister (General Gonatas) said Greece was prepared to agree to a GreekAlbanian frontier inquiry as suggested by the United Nations Security Council, which was considering the Ukrainian complaint that Greece was threatening the peace of the Balkans.