TRAPPED FORCES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25454, 8 February 1944, Page 3

TRAPPED FORCES

GERMANS DESPERATE VIOLENT COUNTER-ATTACKS (Rec. 1.50 a m.) LONDON, Feb. 7. The Germans are still trying desperately to break out of the two rings around them in the Nikopol and Shpola areas, says t!he Moscow newspaper Pravda. Reports from north-west of Krivoi Rog and north-west of Nikopol state that the Germans are everywhere putting up a furious resistance and launching violent counter-attacks, but their defences have been breached on a wide front.

Unfavourable weather has handicapped the Russian offensive. Rains have swept away the snow, turning the roads into bogs. Describing the battle of Kanev, the Pravda war correspondent says: “The air echoes with the din of our terrible cannonade. The Russian troops are drawing the ring ever tighter and are multiplying the blows against the enemy, bringing nearer the final hour of retribution. The Germans launch dozens of fierce counter-attacks every day in the hope of ramming a breach in our lines, but every time they meet a squall of fire and are rolled back.” The Vichy radio reports that the Russians launched a new drive in the Staraya Russa area and have broken through locally at several points. The Stockholm correspondent of the British United Press quotes a Berlin High Command report that the Russians. attacking with several motorised divisions, have broken into the town of Kerch.

An atmosphere of depression exists in Berlin regarding the eastern front, states the Exchange Telegraph’s Zurich correspondent. This reflects the critical situation with reports from the front stating that the only hopes are the exhaustion of the Red Army or a sudden'change in the weather. Other reports impress on the German nation that because of the developments on the eastern front they must be prepared for further extensive sacrifices.