Evening star., 1941-06-30
(Tert OF German Special Com
muniqueS on Page A-6.)
By the Associated Press.

b the Associated Press.
BERLIN, June 30.-German
troops were reported today to
have captured Minsk and to be
almost half way along the 450-
mile road from Minsk to Moscow.
A German military spokesman as
serted Minsk was in German hands
ehortely after the high command re-
ported the capture of Lwow, on the
lower Polish front, and Libau, Lat
Wan port on the Baltic sea.
The spokesman intimated Ger
man troops were in sight Of Smo-
Iensk, 200 miles east of Minsk. A
big pocket was being formed around
Russian troops in the Smolensk
region, he said.
Many Russians Left Behind.
The German armored divisions
making these swift jabs fartheSt
east admittedly have left many
Russians behind them, to the west,
and it was acknowledged that the
country across which they have
sped cannot be regarded as Ger
man-occupied.
Smolensk is nearly 400 miles air.
line from the nearest point in the
German Russian established border
established after the partition of
Poland in 1899. 1t is about $50 miles
from Dvinsk, in Latvia, which the
German high command announced
was captured Thursday.
The troops now reported within
sight of Smolensk might have ad-
vanced either southeast from Dvinsk
or northeast from Minsk, or both.
Smolensk is east of the zone of
German control established during
the German invasion Of Bolshevist
Russia in 1918.
The high command bulletin on
the capture of the Latyian port was
preceded by a report that Soviet
Russian division near the Baltic
coast had been encircled in new
German northward push in Lithu-
ania and Latvia.
Ring Is Drawn Tighter.
The fall of Lwow was announced
In a special communique and that
of Libau in the regular daily war
bulletin issued later, after an un-
usual delay.
1t said the German ring around
Russian armies in the central sector
of the long eastern front was being
drawn tighter but, save for the cap
ture of Lwow and Libau, its report
on that war theater was brief and
bare of detail, saying only:
"As already announced in a spe-
cial communique, our troops ad-
vancing in Galicia captured Lwow.
In the middle battle front the ring
about surrounded Soviet armies is
being drawn more tightly. On the
north wing we are in constant pur-
suit.
"On the coast, Libau was taken"
THE ring is so narrow and tight"
around the Red Army forces on the
Baltic front, D. N. B., official Ger
man news agency, said, that de-
struction of the Bolshevist units is
certain"
The agency also said several hun
dred Russian tanks and AZ cannon
were destroyed or captured by Ger
man forces at Rawa Ruska, just in
side Sovletized Poland about 40 miles
northwest of Lwow. The latter for
titled city, also known as Lemberg,
wss the scene of fierce German
Russian fighting in the World War.
Flag Over Lwow Citadel.
The capture of Lwow was re-
ported first from the Fuehrer's
headquarters in this brief announce
ment:
'Lwow was taken today. The
Reichs war flag has been flying
from the citadel since 4:20 am"
(9:20 pm, E. S. T. Sunday.
D.N.B. dispatches said the Luft-
waite had concentrated fierce air
assaults in the Minsk region today
and that four Russian planes were
shot down and another 73 destroyed
on the ground in that sector.
In large-scale air battle on the
Lwow front, it said, 81 Russian
planes were shot down and IA more
destroyed on the ground.
In all, it said, 214 Russian planes
have been destroyed or damaged on
the ground last night and so far