GROUND REGAINED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 6 October 1941, Page 5

GROUND REGAINED

IN <WIDELY=SEPARATED ' AREAS RUSSIANS FIGHTING BACK STRONGLY. BUDENNY'S DRIVE IN SOUTH. (By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright) LONDON, October 5. Today, the beginning of the sixteenth week of the battle in Russia, finds the Russians still holding grimly to their lines and fighting strongly at several points. Russian counter-attacks have pushed the Germans back at new points on the central front and in the Leningrad and Odessa sectors. Moscow radio says that Marshal Timoshenko’s forces have driven the Germans back 15 miles in one sector of the central front, while . in the Leningrad sector Russian troops advanced 13 miles at some points. Marshal Budenny’s forces in the southern Ukraine have launched a strong counter-attack to relieve the German pressure on the Crimea. The Germans and Rumanians were ejected from 30 settlements. The “Izvestia” reports that the Russians recaptured a city railway junction in an important sector of the Karelian Isthmus. More than 600 Finns were killed. There is a fierce battle on the shore of Lake Ladoga, where )the Finns have concentrated large forces in an effort to break through to Leningrad. The Russians killed 1200 of the enemy. The situation in the Ukraine is extremely critical for the Russians, according to the “Daily Telegraph’s’ ' Stockholm correspondent, who declares that they will have to. retreat considerably further before being able to stabilise the front. The “Daily Mail’s” Stockholm correspondent says General Rundstedt has launched a vast new offensive, apparently aimed at the junction of Marshal Timoshenko’s and Marshal Budenny’s armies near Kurks, with the object of turning both Soviet flanks and then driving north to Moscow. The latest Russian communique states: “On October 3 our troops were engaged in fighting along the .entire front. On October 1 16 German planes were shot down in aerial combat. Our losses were eight planes. In one sec- • lor R.A.F. pilots shot down four Messerschmitts 109’s without loss to , themselves. A German submarine was sunk by units of the northern fleet.” STRAIGHT LINE NOW HELD BY RUSSIANS. DANGER OF ENCIRCLEMENT AVERTED. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, October 4. The Russian front line from the Baltic to the Black Sea is now more .or less straight. The absence of major salients means that no Russian forces are in,danger of encirclement unless the Germans made new thrusts and these will involve frontal attacks. In Finland, in a successful counterattack the Russians ' have thrown the Germans back to the west bank of the River Litha. OIL FOR, TURKEY RUSSIA PROMISES SUPPLIES. LONDON, October 4. Russia has notified Turkey that she can supply her with oil. This follows advice that Rumania is unable to arrange oil deliveries to Turkey.