RAIDS ON PARIS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 June 1940, Page 5

RAIDS ON PARIS

OVER NINE HUNDRED CASUALTIES INCLUDING 254 DEAD. REPRISALS ALREADY TAKEN. A French War Ministry communique, broadcast by Daventry, states that the casualties in the German raids on Paris total 906, 254 dead and 652 wounded. German planes brought down are now estimated at 25. The killed included 195 civilians. A French spokesman said French aircraft had already carried out reprisals by attacks on airports and industrial objectives at Munich and Frankfurt. NOTICE SERVED INTIMATION TO NAZI CITIES. PARIS, June 4. The radio in a German-language transmission announced that Nazi cities will take the consequences of yesterday's bombings. There was no air-raid warning in Paris this morning, and business is going on as usual. The reaction to the raid can be summed up in a demand for reprisals. LE HAVRE BOMBED MORE CIVILIAN VICTIMS. NUMBER OF PRIVATE HOUSES DESTROYED. LONDON, June 4. It is announced from Paris that German aircraft carried out a three-hour raid in the region of Le Havre. Highexplosive bombs were dropped. There is no news as yet of the results of the raid, but a number of private houses were destroyed, and victims are being rescued from the wreckage. Le Havre, on the west coast of France, at the mouth of the River Seine, has a population of about 165,000. In the 1914-18 war it was the base of the British Expeditionary Force. PARTIAL REPRISAL ALREADY CARRIED OUT. NECESSITY FOR SECRECY. (Received This Day. 9.40 a.m.) PARIS. June 4. A military spokesman said the French Air Force had already carried out a partial reprisal for the bombing I of Paris. He emphasised the necessity for secrecy surrounding reprisals,

LE HAVRE ATTACK NUMBER OF PEOPLE ENTOMBED. (Received This Day, 9.55 a.m.) PARIS. June 4. High explosive bombs were dropped in Le Havre region between 10.15 p.m. and 1.30 a.m. A hit was scored on a private house, entombing a number of people in the wreckage, from which •they were extricated. .

A Ministry of Information spokesman was unable to confirm or deny that Berlin was bombed during the night.

GERMAN REPORT EIGHTY PERSONS KILLED IN MUNICH. SUBSTANTIAL DAMAGE DONE TO FACTORY. (Received This Day, 9.55 a.m.) BERLIN, June 4. It is reported that 80 persons were killed when an Allied plane bombed a Munich suburb at 2 a.m. A bomb substantially damaged a factory. INVENTED STORY? GERMANS REPORT RAID ON FREIBURG. LONDON, June 4. The German official news agency reports that 53 civilians were killed and 151 wounded by an enemy raid against the open town of Freiburg-im-Breisgau (10 miles across the frontier due east of Colmar). Those killed, the agency states, included 20 children. The Germany agency also claims that the German Air Force attacked all types of aerodromes in and round Paris and destroyed numerous planes on the ground. It states that 70 enemy planes were shot down in air battle, and five German planes are missing.

An English broadcast from Berlin declares that the Paris raid was confined to aerodromes and denies that bombs were dropped on the city. The British Air Ministry denies that Frciburg-im-Breisgau was raided and declares it is obviously an attempt to justify the bombing of Paris. It is significant that no date is given for the alleged raid. .The Germans made the same untrue allegation some weeks ago. . , Practically all German wireless stations faded out last night, Berlin and Hamburg at 11.40 o’clock.