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(4-6) Nauru Island

Nauru is an island country in Micronesia in the Central Pacific. With it´s 21-square-kilometre area it is the smallest state in the South Pacific and third smallest state by area in the world. During World War II, Nauru was subject to significant damage from Axis and Allied forces. On 6th and 7th December 1940 the Nazi German auxiliary cruisers Orion and Komet sank four merchant ships. On the next day, Komet shelled Nauru's phosphate mining areas, oil storage depots, and the shiploading cantilever. The attacks seriously disrupted phosphate supplies to Australia and New Zealand which were mostly used for munition and fertiliser purposes.