LOSSES IN SYRIA.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXI, Issue 194, 18 July 1941, Page 6

LOSSES IN SYRIA.

(Pec. 2.15 p.m.) LONDON, July 17. The casualties of the Vichy forces in Syria totalled four to five thousand, including a thousand killed, according to Erce French sources. Eorty-five thousand Vichy troops were engaged in the war, including 10,000 Syrians and Lebanese, and 5000 members of the Foreign Legion. The Daily Telegraph's correspondent at Beirut says that before his departure General Dentz told a gathering ot Frenchmen that they had been dealing with people who displayed much understanding and behaved like fighting veterans. The armistice terms were more favourable -than he had expected and would have been even more so but for some do Gaulle supporters. Thousands of refugees who were driven to Turkey by the Vichy antiSemitic policy and lack of commodities, particularly food, due to the effective British blockade, are preparing to return to Syria. The disarmament of eleven French ships lying at Alexandretta has been completed under Turkish supervision and the crews interned.