Poles take Russia to court over 1940 Katyn massacre

The Belfast Telegraph ^ | 24 April 2006

[lizol]

Poles take Russia to court over 1940 Katyn massacre

24 April 2006

Relatives of Polish soldiers executed by Joseph Stalin's secret police in one of the Second World War's most infamous massacres are to take Russia to the European Court of Human Rights to try to make it disclose the full truth about the killings.

In the so-called Katyn atrocities, personally ordered by Stalin in 1940, the NKVD (forerunner of the KGB) killed 21,587 Polish Army reservists in cold blood on the grounds that they were "hardened and uncompromising enemies of Soviet authority". Russia has refused to prosecute surviving suspects or reveal their names. It is keeping two-thirds of the files on the subject classified, and has classed the murders as an ordinary crime whose statute of limitations has expired.

Relatives of victims say that the killings amounted to genocide and that Russia has a moral obligation to open its archive on them.

The killings took place at three locations but the massacre took its name from just one, the Katyn Forest in modern-day Belarus. The murders killed many of Poland's intelligentsia; among the dead were officers, chaplains, writers, professors, journalists, engineers, lawyers, aristocrats and teachers. All were killed by a single shot to the back of the head.

Some 15,000 bodies have been found and the rest are thought to be still buried in secret mass graves.

The murders have soured Moscow's relations with Poland for six decades, with Warsaw accusing the Kremlin of deceit, a lack of remorse and brutal indifference. It was only in 1989 that the then Soviet President, Mikhail Gorbachev, admitted that the killings had been perpetrated by Stalin's secret police. Before that the USSR blamed the atrocities on the Nazis who occupied the area during the war, even going to the trouble of reburying bodies and bulldozing evidence in an elaborate attempt to deflect blame.

Seventy families related to the murdered soldiers are to lodge a case at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg in the next few weeks. Some want surviving suspects to be prosecuted, while others simply want the killings to be classed as genocide and for Russia to be forced to disclose everything it knows about the atrocity.

"We are not interested in revenge or even in punishing anyone," said one Katyn survivor, Mgr Zdzislaw Peszkowski, aged 85. "We only want the full truth to be universally known. This is not just a Polish issue. Revealing all the circumstances of this atrocity is needed to finally close the chapter known as the Second World War."

Lawyers for the families believe that Russia flouted the European Convention on Human Rights by never properly investigating the atrocities. Russia's "investigation" lasted for more than a decade on and off and was definitively closed in September 2004. Poland's Institute of National Remembrance has said that Russia's position on Katyn was a "humiliation of the memory of the Polish victims and an offence to the feelings of their living family members".

[GarySpFc]

Russia has refused to prosecute surviving suspects or reveal their names.

I agree those guilty of participating in the massacre at Katyn should be prosecuted to the full extent. Indeed, I believe they should hang.

[robowombat]

Are there any Freepers who can comment on the authenticity of the following book purportedly written by a survivor of the Katyn Woods massacre:

Night Never Ending
by Eugenjusz Andrei Komorowski, Joseph L. Gilmore

Book, H. Regnery (January 1974)
It is fascinating reading in a very dark way.

[jamaksin]

You will note that the former Allies of WWII are very very silent on this issue.

[Ptarmigan]

Amen to that! It is a horrible travesty it even happened. We should also went after the Soviet Union during World War II. General Patton suggested to nuke them after we defeated the Axis.

[AzSteven]

You will note that the former Allies of WWII are very very silent on this issue.

Probably becuase they helped cover it up. Katyn was invesitgated by Red Cross and neutral country representatives when the Germans found the main burial site, and the investigation was pretty clear in its results of Soviet guilt. However, the allies were unwilling to support the German position as that would threaten the alliance against Nazi Germany - they probably felt winning the war trumped the truth in this case.

After the war, I guess the US and the UK figured they would look stupid or duplicious to change their story, and so neither country made a big deal of it. I think I can understand not making a big issue of it during the war, but it was an injustice to keep quiet about it afterwards.

[lizol]

Couldn't add anything to your words.

[RusIvan]

I agree those guilty of participating in the massacre at Katyn should be prosecuted to the full extent. Indeed, I believe they should hang.==

Agreed. But in same time we need to condemn Pulsudskii regime of Poland which guilty of deathes about 20000 Red army POWs in polish camps.
The Pilsudkii murderers are all dead now so no one to persenally prosecute.

[RusIvan]

In the so-called Katyn atrocities, personally ordered by Stalin in 1940, the NKVD (forerunner of the KGB) killed 21,587 Polish Army reservists in cold blood on the grounds that they were "hardened and uncompromising enemies of Soviet authority".==

Stalin wasn't Russian but Georgian. Stalin secret police was run by other Georgian Beria. Why not file suit against Georgia?

Secondly, Lizol you miss the stubborn fact that NKWD was founded and developed by 2 poles: Felix Dzehrinskii and Vazlav Menzhinskii. They killed many russians. Do we need to file suit against Poland today?

[lizol]

RusIvan - my advice is - don't speak, when you have no clue about the topic of the discussion.

Why not file suit against Georgia?

Maybe the reason is, that it's Russia, not Georgia, being a legal successor of USSR on the international stage (try to google for: russia, "legal successor", "soviet union"

The other reason may be, that it's Russia, not Georgia, that conducted investigation at some point, terminated it, an dfinally refused to prosecute surviving suspects or reveal their names.

And the thing is, that - if you read the article you'd know, that it's not Poland, that is going to file a suit against Russia at the Strasbourg Tribunal for Human Rights, but Polish citizens, private persons - relatives of those, who were killed in Katyn.

It's a situation a bit similar to Turkey, that constantly is being sued by Kurds - for having terminated investigations against Turkich soldiers, or security officers, who did something evil to Kurdish people.

Art. 13 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, constituting the right to an effective remedy says:
Everyone whose rights and freedoms as set forth in this Convention are violated shall have an effective remedy before a national authority notwithstanding that the violation has been committed by persons acting in an official capacity.

[RusIvan]

Maybe the reason is, that it's Russia, not Georgia, being a legal successor of USSR on the international stage (try to google for: russia, "legal successor", "soviet union"==

It is central point. We need once throughly research WHAT really Russia got on herself when she picked up after USSR disbanded. Russia picked up legal obligations of USSR in signed on that moment treaties and debts of USSR. But she agreed on that in return and all active property of USSR abroad be given to Russia. That is all. No more Russia do not represent Soviet Union.
SO my guess their suit will be disbanded because of wrong party was claimed. We will see it although I admit that western courts may be very politically motivated.

It's a situation a bit similar to Turkey, that constantly is being sued by Kurds - for having terminated investigations against Turkich soldiers, or security officers, who did something evil to Kurdish people.==

Chechens may use that way but not poles. Russia do not fight war with poles today.

[lizol]

If you were right, then any kind of rehabilitation of victims of Stalinism would be impossible in Russia - as Russian authorities could say - "sorry, wrong address, we are wrong party (as you described it), we're Russia now, and we have nothing to do with problems relating to the Soviet Union. You were hurt by the Soviets, so we have no power to investigate whether you were actually a victim od stalinism, or not".

Whereas - as far as I know - you have some law in Russia, that allows to rehabilitate people, who were punished by Soviet courts for political reasons.

Following your logic - if - let's say - a KGB officer had murdered someone several days just before the dissolution of SU in 1991 - purely because of political reason, carrying out his orders (I bet cases like that had occured somewhere in Russia) - then the brand new Russian authorities would have denied any investigation - as it was an crime of an officer of a country, that does not exist anymore, and they would be "a wrong party".

Right?

[jlhawthorne]

I am the daughter of Joseph Gilmore, the man who wrote Night Never Ending, and I can attest to the truth of the account.

[robowombat]

That was a post from long ago. I was struck with the power of your father's account and found his book one of the few that I could not put down. He apparently spent most of his life in the US hiding his identity to keep NKVD assassins from finding him. These people were and their successors most likely are still present and at work in the US today.