SIMLA REPORT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 30 August 1941, Page 5

SIMLA REPORT

CAPTURE OF SKODA GUNS CESSATION OF HOSTILITIES ORDERED BY SHAH. PLEA BY IRANIAN COMMANDER REJECTED. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 9.20 a.m. RUGBY, August 29. Evidence of German influence in Iran is provided by a Simla communique, which reveals that two captured anti-tank guns proved to be of the latest Skoda manufacture. The communique states: “The Shah has ordered his forces to cease hostilities and Iranian envoys have met our forward troops with this information. “In the northern sector British and Indian troops, pushing on from Shahabad on Thursday, were met by a flag. of truce from the Iranian Army, which had retired to Kermanshah. The Iranian commander offered to withdraw his troops and surrender the town if given until September 1 but our commander, having information frorn a prisoner that Germans were in Kermanshah and had been advising the Iranians on defence plans, rightly refused. to accept such delay and insisted that the Iranians should withdraw from their defensive positions by successive stages, starting immediately. It is significant that during the previous day’s action two anti-tank guns which were captured intact, with ammunition, proved to be of the latest Skoda manufacture. “In the southern sector Indian infantry continued to advance up both banks of the Karun River to Ahwaz. which now is in our hands. R.A.F fighters provided air protection for our forward troops during these operations. “A new Russian column is reported to have reached Dilman, west of Lake Urmia, and their southward advance is continuing. “Local inhabitants have been complaining that Iranian troops have been begging for food from them, owing to their rations being short. Our policy is to assist the Persian people, by providing -foodstuffs to lessen the general shortage existing throughout the country. For a start arrangements have been made to send about 700 tons of wheat into the area we have occupied in Southern Iran.” MARCHING AS FRIENDS BRITISH ANNOUNCEMENT TO IRANIANS. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 9.20 a.m.) RUGBY, August 29. During the advance into Iran the R.A.F. dropped a quantity of leaflets on towns, bringing home to the Iranian people the salient point that the British troops were operating “to keep out the accursed Germans.” ; The leaflets made it clear that the British did not require the country’s food but, that if food were needed in Iran, it would be brought in, as was being done in Syria. “We don’t want your food,” the leaflet continued. <“but we will open your ports to trade as we are doing in Iraq. Wc come as friends, armed only against the common enemy. The Germans prey on conquered peoples like starving locusts. If the

Germans had had time to secure a hold on Iran before the arrival of British troops they, to hinder our advance, would have destroyed your cattle, burned your crops and turned Iran into a desert. From such a fate we are saving you, as we saved Iraq and Syria. Soldiers of Iran, we are marching into your country as your friends, doing nothing against your country’s well-being or freedom. All we want to do is to keep out the accursed Germans. Our greeting to you is: ‘Peace be with you.’ Let your reply be: ‘And on you be peace.’ ”