MURDER BOMBING

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 May 1941, Page 6

MURDER BOMBING

DEEDS OF THE LUFTWAFFE IN GREECE WHOLESALE SLAUGHTER. HOSPITAL SHIPS SUNK DELIBERATELY. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) (Received This Day, 12.20 p.m.) LONDON, May 6. Terrible destruction was wrought in Greece by German air attacks. The Luftwaffe bombed Greek cities and ports absolutely indiscriminately and converted towns and villages into smoking heaps of wreckage. Women, children and aged people were machine-gunned. Hospitals in Jannina were destroyed, burying patients, doctors and nurses under debris. Over a thousand civilians were killed in Larissa, where the German Air Force completed the work of the Italians and an earthquake. Two thousand out of a population of 18,000 were killed in Trikkala, which was razed. Lamia suffered similarly. Many other towns and ports were implacably bombed without the least discrimination, causing heavy loss of life. All five Greek hospital ships were sunk, although they were unarmed, carried full lights at night and bore the regulation Red Cross marking. Survivors struggling in the sea were pitilessly machine-gunned. The sinking of the Hellenis was particularly flagrant, because she carried women and children. Few survived.