FOURTH TIME

Wairarapa Times-Age, 24 August 1943, Page 3

FOURTH TIME

CITY HAS CHANGED HANDS IN TWO YEARS > — THRUST OF THE RUSSIAN SPEARHEADS. ALREADY DRIVEN FAR TO WEST. » LONDON, August 23. This is the fourth time Kharkov has chchanged hands in the last two years. The Germans captured the city in October, 1941, four months after their invasion of Russia. Last February the Red Army retook it but was unable to consolidate before the early spring and Germans re-entered the town a month later in their counter-offensive. Claiming that Kharkov had been evacuated according to plan and without interference the German news agency added: —“Since the town has changed several times in the course of the fighting it no longer has any value as a communications and supply centre in its present condition. The German lines are considerably shortened and improved by this disen'gaging movement.” With Kharkov, as well as Orel, now in their hands, the Russians for the first time since 1941 hold the entire main trunk railway between Moscow and southern Russia. The Red Army, while closing its grip round Kharkov, has been battering its way far beyond the city, and during the weekend reported that its spearheads were some 75 miles due west and 100 miles north-west of Kharkov. MEDICAL SUPPLIES FOR THE SOVIET UNION. GENEROUS PUBLIC RESPONSE IN BRITAIN. LONDON.' August 22. Mrs. Churchill, wife of the British Prime Minister, in her broadcast from Quebec, said she had made it her aim nearly two years ago to translate into practical shape those deep emotions of admiration, gratitude and sympathy with our Russian Allies by which the people of Britain and the Empire had been stirred. The public response had been so great that the difficulty had been to obtain the medical supplies for which funds had been subscribed. They were now engaged in fulfilling the latest list of Russian needs. It contained 101 items, including 200,000 bottles of insulin. 100 tons of aspirin, and 10,000 boxes of X-ray films.