NOW ONLY 50 MILES FROM DNIEPER

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 February 1943, Page 3

NOW ONLY 50 MILES FROM DNIEPER

Germans Throwing in Crack Troops IN UNSUCCESSFUL ATTEMPTS TO' ARREST RUSSIAN PROGRESS ROSTOV FORTIFICATIONS BEING SYSTEMATICALLY SMASHED LONDON, February 12. The Russian armies, swiftly exploiting- their victory at Lozovava, have today driven deeper their wedge between the German armies in Kharkov and those in the Donetz Basin. The latest front line despatches state that the Russian spearhead is now only fifty miles from the Dnieper River. Mr Paul Winterton, the London “News-Chronicle’s” Moscow correspondent says the capture of Lazovava has given the Germans a real shock and they are throwing in crack troops, but the Russians have hurled them back. The strongest German resistance is just to the east of Lozovava. The Germans are doing everything they can to prevent the Soviet jaws from closing down on the Azov Sea coast and cutting their last communications with the Donetz Basin. At Rostov the Russians are systematically smashing the enemy fortifications with artillery and are pressing hard against the city. There is no more official news of the Russian column which crossed the Don and wheeled round to the north of Rostov, though there is no indication that it has been checked. The Russians have now crossed into the Donetz Basin well to the north-east of Rostov and are sweeping ahead very rapidly. North of the Lozovava wedge the Russian net round Kharkov is drawing closer every day. The Red Army is now south, north and east of this great Ukrainian city, and is still movingforward. Good progress is also being made further up the front beyond Kursk. Unofficial reports state that the Russians are only 30 miles south of Orel, one of the main bastions of the German winter defence line.