ROME INVADED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 18 August 1943, Page 4

ROME INVADED

BY REFUGEES FROM NORTH & SOUTH PAPAL TERRITORY OCCUPIED. TROOPS & POLICE SWEPT * ASIDE. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) (Received 1 This Day, 10.45 a.m.) LONDON, August 17. Following on further R.A.F. .raids on northern industrial cities, a report from Berne states, the evacuation of the whole of Northern Italy is imminent. A British United Press correspondent on the Italian frontier declares that Milan is now a city of the dead. All activity appears to have been blotted out. Fresh fires are springing up every hour and buildings still crashing across the streets. Defying the Italian Government ban, thousands of refugees from Northern and Southern Italy are pouring into Rome. The influx follows on the Italian Government’s attempt to have Rome recognised by the Allies as an opeh city, exempt from air raids. Some families haye set up tents in St. Peter’s Square, and hundreds of families have invaded Vatican City. Many refugees brought, their bedding and furniture and are establishing “homes” on Papal property. The Papal Guards were forced to withdraw before a de-' termined influx. Italian troops and po-. lice who were instructed to halt re-i fugees outside Rome were pushed aside and were powerless to halt the crowds. Rome is already overcrowded, and there is a serious food shortage.