Important gains by Chinese troops operating in the Woosung and Lotien sectors were claimed by a Chinese military spokesman at a press conference yesterday afternoon, In a flanking movement launched late on Thursday night, Chinese forces captured Siao Chuensha yesterday morning, thus completing a cor-around the Japanese troops in the vicinity of Lotien.
Siao Chuensha, the spokesman explained, was the original landing place of the Japanese troops now surrounded at Lotien,. Apparently taken by surprise, the Japapese guarding the rear were dislodged by a severe Chinese attack from the north-west of Siao Chuensha, Up to yesterday, the spokesman said, two-thirds of the entire area of Lotion were in Chinese hands, the important small villages of Menchiacheh and Pangehiachen in the vicinity having fallen into Chinese bands. The surrounded Japanese, he said, were very short of foodstuffs and ammunition.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.