BIG TROOP CONCENTRATION

Greymouth Evening Star, 5 July 1950, Page 5

BIG TROOP CONCENTRATION

The North Koreans apparently are reconnoitring in. force behind the tanks’ spearhead to locate American and South Korean positions, said the spokesman. “If this is not the largest, it is the most efficient concentration they have yet put in,” he added. North Koreans in the centre of the peninsula have reached Chungji, 65 miles south-east of Seoul, where a party of 50 was reported. Three hundred infantry were also reported to have been sighted at a point 10 miles west of Chungji. Convoy Of Tanks A communique issued by General MacArthur today said that the North Korean forces continued to consolidate their forces below the Han river, south of Seoul and east of Suwon. A convoy of 25 enemy tanks was observed moving towards Seoul from Kaesong. Three miscellaneous armed columns, believed to be elements from several North Korean divisions, were located in the Seoul area. They are describing a wide flanking movement south-east of Suwon, which threatens the encirclement of the South Korean forces in the Inchon-Seoul-Suwan triangle.

' Fighting is going on between North and South Koreans at Inchon port, 25 miles west of Seoul. Another force is reported to be moving south-west through Yangpyong. to converge with the first flanking movement in the vicinity of Kumyangjan. South Koreans have already engaged a column of about 600 enemy troops, supported by artillery and anti-tank weapons, near Kumyangjan. A North Korean division, which has been located at Chungehon, sent about 800 infantrymen with four tanks and five armoured cars across the Han river and were later located about 35 miles south-east of Seoul. Food Commandeered General MacArthur’s communique says that North Korean troops have been reported as commandeering food stocks from the civilian populace in Seoul. An undetermined

number of North Korean troops, posing as refugees, were reported to have crossed the Han river for intelligence and sabotage purposes. The Russian news agency Tass claimed last night that the South Korean Government had fled from Taejon, after being driven successively from Seoul and Suwon by the advancing North Korean Red armies. BRITISH REACTION TO SOVIET STATEMENT LONDON, July 4 (Rec. 1.15 p.m.). —A Foreign Office spokesman, criticising Mr Gromyko’s statement on Korea as “an attempt to represent the application of military sanctions against North Korea as wholly an American venture” said that many other countries, including Britain, had volunteered to give forces to support the Security Council resolution permitting sanctions. He added that Mr Gromyko’s statement seemed to add little to the statements Moscow had already made, MacArthur Speaks On

Treatment Of Prisoners

TOKIO, July 5 (Rec. 1.30 p.m.).— General MacArthur declared yesterday that he would “hold responsible any individual acting for North Korea” who deviated from humanitarian principles in the treatment of prisoners or who causes, permits or orders any deviation. Any North Koreans who are taken into custody or fall into the hands of the armed forces now under his operational control in Korea will be treated in accordance with humanitarian principles, recognised by civilised nations involved in armed conflict, he said. “I’will expect similar treatment for American nationals, as well as other nationals, who may join the United States in the Korean conflict and who may at any time be in North Korean hands,” General MacArthur added.