AXIS SIXTH ARMY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 29 January 1943, Page 3

AXIS SIXTH ARMY

COMPLETE LIQUIDATION REPORTED FURTHER HAUL OF PRISONERS SOUTH OF VORONEZH. ENCIRCLEMENT OF ENEMY FORCES. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, January 28. A special Moscow annouricement last night stated that liquidation of the German Sixth Army before Stalingrad has been completed. It was also announced last, night that 5000 more of the encircled Axis troops in the Voronezh front were forced to surender (bringing the recorded total for this area to 80,000). A communique today, which says that the Red Army has kept up its pressure on all six fronts, adds that further progress was made on the Voronezh front. ‘The enemy tried to stem the advance in the region of two inhabited localities but were forced to give ground, and suffered heavy losses in men and material.” A Moscow correspondent says that the main Russian strategy on. the Voronezh front still seems to be aimed at the ultimate encirclement of the big German force in the Donetz Basin. A large number of the enemy are already surrounded. The Russians on the Voronezh front have captured the large railway station of Gorschechnoye. about 60 miles south-west of Voronezh, on the YeletsValuiki railway. On the southern front they have captured Egorlyk and Novo Alexandrovskaya, 50 and 40 miles respectively east of Kavaskaya, and also Srednyogorlik, 50 miles northwest of Salsk and 70 miles south-east of Rostov, and Neftegorsk, the oil centre, 30 miles north-eastward of Tuapse on the railway to Armavir. A DEFENSIVE BARRIER. The Stockholm correspondent of “The Times” says that the German forces are becoming congested on the railways of the western Caucasus,

with the Russions in the immediate approaches to the Kavkaskaya and Tikhoretsk junctions. A barrier which the Germans hope to defend apparently includes an arc drawn from Tikhoretsk with Rostov near the centre. However, it is unlikely that the Germans really expect to ste mthe Russian offensive so far to the east, though hard fighting is certain before the Russians can overcome this delaying barrier and surge into the heart of the Donetz Basin. The most important other operations on the southern front, says this correspondent, are west and south-west of Voronezh, where the Russians are again demonstrating their superior winter mobility, and the Germans and Hungarians are doomed to suffer further encirclements before their lines are shortened by the retreat. Heavy fighting continues in the Velikiye Luki and Leningrad regions, though no fresh changes are reported. New activity is recorded in the Volkhov and Rzhev areas. Good news is expected to be announced shortly from the Leningrad sector, says the “Daily Express’s” military correspondent, Morley Richards. Last night there were new reports of fierce fighting south of Lake Ladoga.