Earlier Messages

Manawatu Times, Volume 65, Issue 229, 27 September 1940, Page 7

Earlier Messages

JAPANESE THRUST RESISTED LONDON, Sept. 25 It is officially stated at Hanoi that border fighting between the French and Japanese in Indo-China continues along a 50-mile front centred on Langson. Tho latest reports are that the Japanese vanguards have reached Kch along tho Langson-Cao Bank highway, and also that they have reached the vicinity of Lac Binh along the Langson-Mokay highway. It is officially announced at Hanoi that the French withdrew from Langson while the Japanese were encircling it with superior numbers. Tho French Foreign Ministry, meanwhile, announced to-day that General Nishihara, leader of the Japanese Mission to Indo-China, had negotiated a termination of the Japanese aggression at. Dong Dang, thus ending the border fighting. French official circles at. Haiphong declare that, since the Japanese are continuing to infringe the terms of the Hanoi agreement by trying to enter Indo-China forcibly, tho French regard the agreement as cancelled. It is officially stated at Hanoi that the French remain firmly decided to carry out tho terms of the Hanoi agreement. However, Indo-China cannot tolerate the position that an agreement hardly signed should be broken by tho initiative of the Japanese Southern China Command. Indo-China remains decided to oppose itself by force to the attack of the Japanese Southern China Army.

A message from Tokio, however, sayß that the Japanese forces in Southern China announced to-day that they had started advancing undisclosed units of Japanese troops into Indo-China via Haiphong.