STREET FIGHTING

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21580, 6 December 1944, Page 3

STREET FIGHTING

CRISIS’ IN GREECE PREMIER TO RESIGN? BkiliSH INVOLVEMENT (10 a.m.) - LONDON, Dec. 5. Reuter’s Athens correspondent says that M. Papancireou is tendering ins resignation. ihe Liberal Party leader, ivi, Emmanuel Soioulis, me possioie new Premier, is making contact with other parties, including tire E.A.M. fighting in Athens and the Piraeus area was reported by Reuter’s Athens correspondent m a dispatch hue last night, quoting a senior Green ponce omcer. The correspondent said tnai the E.A.M. . had occupied and taken control of .20.0 f 25 police stations in the Athens and the Piraeus area, righting is going on for another ponce station,, ana there is also ligating around the central gaol.

An enure L.uico. un'u.un is re ported to nave nuiUraied nuo .-uncus in groups iri the last 30 hours, ihe Government: is . wimoui news or the situation outside the capital.

ihe Dally Express xikuis correspondent says'the E.A.M.. which is the left-wing . National Liberation rront, claims 1,500,000 members, it boasts its'own guerrilla army (E.L.A.S.) oi UU.UUO, plus at least as many unarmed reserves, and : also has its own ponce force ancl an eilicient political machine, which has largely administered Free . Greece throughout the occupation. •• This organisation sun largely controls the country outside Athens.

opposing -the E.L.A.S. in fact, if not in theory, is the E.D.E.S., which is the army of General Zervas, a snort, stout, bearded soldier who claims that ms army, although it contains many iughust officers, is strictly non-politi-cal. The,-E.D.E.S. is not a large iorce, and probably does not exceed 10,000. However, it has been veil armed by the Allies and ns lire-po.ver is stated to be equal to that of the E.L.A.S. ,

The Athens correspondent of the Associated Press reports that a determined E.L.A.b. attack was muue on ounday night against the joint British and Greek naval headquarters at the Piraeus. A British naval communique states that the attack was repulsed, three British were wounded, one seriously. The attackers killed an interpreter for the British, who was sitting in a Royal Navy car outside me headquarters.