IN MESOPOTAMIA.

Taranaki Daily News, 31 January 1916, Page 5

IN MESOPOTAMIA.

RESULT OF RECENT FIGHTING. POSITION SUMMED JUP. ' i tfi BAD WEATHER THE OBSTACLE. London, January The Morning Post thus sums up the situation in Mesopotamia. _ After the, fighting on the Bth the lurks retreated eight miles to a' position midway between Sheikhursad and the right angle bend, of the Tigris, near Elowasa. The position is described as a. wftdi, which is a dry river bed joining. the Tigris on the left bank. General Aylmer is advancing on both banks.

The frontal attack on the 12th was combined with nn outflanking movement to 'the north. The Turks retired in the night five miles to a position astride of the river at the great right angle 'bend of which the northern Hank was covered by marshy ground. The. result of thV, fighting on Friday (January 14) was indecisive, and General Aylmcr was forced to fall back 1:;00 yards from the position. There is little prospect of progress until the weather improves and the country is drained. General Townsend is evidently too rigidly beleaguered to co-opeTafe with the relieving column. Another British force is advancing up the Siif.ttilhai which joins the Tigris at Kut-el-Amra. Probably a force occupied the Euphrates Valley in order to prevent a Turkish ndvance on Basra.

General Aylmcr yesterday reported that there was no change in the situation,