OFFENSIVE BEGUN

New Zealand Herald, Volume 81, Issue 24878, 27 April 1944, Page 5

OFFENSIVE BEGUN

RUSSIANS ATTACKING LOWER DNIESTER FRONT lIKI'OHTS FROM ENEMY i (Red. I•_'.:!() ii.in.) LONDON, April 20 The Russians have begun a big offensive on the lower renches of the Dniester. A Rumanian communique stales that the enemy, after violent artillery preparation, supported by numerous mass air formations, went over to the offensive on a wide front. Heavy lighting is progressing south of Tighina and south of Dubossari, north-east of Chisinau. The Russians are massing between the Dniester and the Seret, and the Fourth Ukrainian Army, hitherto engaged in the Crimea, is moving to the mainland front, according to Berlin broadcasts. Other Russian troop concentrations have been observed in the Narva, Ostrov, Neval and Kowel areas. The German overseas news agency, quoting a Berlin military spokesman, says a last-minute report from the Crimea states that the Russian High Command has concentrated fresh powerful tank and artillery units south-east of Sebastopol for a new assault against the fortress. Russian artillery and mass formations of dive-bombers have been pounding the German positions around Sebastopol day and night. The agency' adds east and north-east Hungary have been declared war zones. A supplementary Moscow communique says that Russian infantry and tanks launched a sudden attack against the enemy's flank south-east of Stanislawow, in the Carpathian foothills area forcing him to retreat, leaving several hundred dead. Livelier activity was reported yesterday from the Carpathian front, where both the Germans and Russians were said to be jockeying for positions in anticipation of a big clash. Renter s .Moscow correspondent said that before the present lull started a Soviet pincer movement was beginning against Lwow. The Germans were trying to improve their positions to resist a major Russian operation, and there were signs of German nervousness on many sectors of the front, from Narva, in Estonia, to the Czechoslovak frontier. A Russian communique says that Soviet long-range bombers attacked concentrations of troop trains at two junctions inside Latvia yesterday. They are key points on the German rail network serving this part of the front. Large fires were started. All the Russian aircraft got back safely. SOVIET ACHIEVEMENT SPECTACULAR ADVANCE FOUR-FIFTHS OF LAND FREE LONDON, April 25 M. Manuilsky, member of the Executive Committee of the Communist Party, in a broadcast, said that 500.000 Germans were killed or captured on the southern front in Russia in March and April. The Red Army's maximum advance from the summer of 1943 to April 15, 1944, on the various sectors ranged from between 500 and 1200 miles. The Russians recaptured 370 towns and over 65.000 inhabited places. "About four-fifths of occupied Soviet soil has already been recaptured," he added. "Red Army victories have facilitated the opening of large-scale military operations in the west and south, which are being awaited with impatience throughout the world." HARASSING OF GERMANS PATRIOTS ! N EUROPE (Reed. (i.lO p.m.) LONDON, April 20 Underground activities against the Nazis in occupied Europe continue. In Yugoslavia the Patriots have announced a campaign to cut off the flow of chrome ore into Germany. They have already sabotaged most of the coal and iron mines in Yugoslavia. French patriots have killed approximately 500 Germans in the centra! part of France. Seven hundred others have been wounded. The patriot losses have been comparatively light.