77,000 GERMANS LOST

Grey River Argus, 1 July 1944, Page 5

77,000 GERMANS LOST

ON RUSSIAN FRONTS In Five Days RED ARMY MOVING ON MINSK B O.W. RUGBY, June 30. A Russian special communique stated: In five days’ fighting from June 23 to June 27 Soviet troops on the Third White Russian front killed and took prisoner a total of l 52,000 Germans troops. In the same period Soviet troops of the First Baltic front killed and took prison- > er 25,000 German troops. | A special announcement by the 1 Soviet Information Bureau, according to Moscow radio, said: Our troops on the Third White Russian front, under General Chernyakhov, between June 23 and June 27 killed 32 000 enemy officers and men, and took 20,000 prisoners, including 300 officers. They destroyed 126 tanks, 796 guns and 290 mortars, and captured 36 tanks, 652 guns, 541 mortars, and 225 dumps. On the First Baltic Front under General Bagramyan between June 23 and June. 27, Russians killed more than 20,000 officers and men, took 5000 prisoners, destroyed 269 self-propelled guns, and captured 31 tanks, 375 guns, - 2zb dumps of war material. A Russian air communique reports: Soviet long-range bombers on Wednesday night again made a mass raid on the Baranovich, Polotsk and Minsk railway junctions, hitting enemy military '.tra Ids _ d.nd war stores, particularly .at Minsk, where fire enveloped the greater part of the junction area. . A Russian communique says: When Germans were retreating with our troops close on their heels, our tanks and' cavalry overtook and routed one enemy motorised division on Minsk highway, which was littered with battered tanks, guns, motor vehicles and German dead. Russian troops liberated 30.000 civilians from concentration camps at Petrozavodsk.