GABES AND BIZERTA

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 87, Issue 2, 4 January 1943, Page 3

GABES AND BIZERTA

ONLY WORKABLE PORTS FOR AXIS IN TUNISIA

(Recd. 9 p.m.) London, Jan. 2. The British United Press Cairo correspondent says reconnaissance photographs have shown that the ceaseless Allied bombing has vitally damaged Sfax and Susa. Reports suggest that Gabes and Bizerta are the only workable ports left to the Germans in Tunisia. " s

Morocco radio declared that, owing to bad weather, operations in Tunisia were confined to lively patrolling and the shelling of enemy positions. (Recd. 9 p.m.) Rugby, Jan. 2. It was announced in London that British units now fighting in Tunisia includes Coldstream and Grenadier Guards, the Northamptonshire Regiment and the Lancashire Fusiliers. The East Surreys and the Hampshires have already been mentioned as taking part in the fighting. A Cairo correspondent says that so heavy have been the air bombardments of Sfax that it is probable that many harbour installations have been damaged so badly that their usefulness is at an end. Heavy bombers of the Allied Air Force in the past fortnight carried out a series of raids which have been as successful as any harbour attack in North Africa.

In assessing the damage of tne last few days a pilot who recently returned from an observation flight and has photographs to confirm his statements reports that the railway road-house is nothing more than a black scar, and that serious damage has been done to all other railway buildings. A large factory northward of the harbour has also been partly destroyed, as have warehouses on the northern quay. An important railway track leading to Sfax has been hit in no fewer than eleven places, and many wagons on sidings were blown up, while a larg~ section of the wharf on the northern quay has been destroyed. “There appears to be little activity in this important area,” says the correspondent. "Very few of the cracks hav been filled in. The majority of the railway wagons are standing about empty and the once busy sidings appear to be deserted.” —8.0.W.