Soviet repressions in Belarus
Encyclopedia
History
The repressions started in 1917 and have reached their peak during the 1930s and especially during the USSR-wide Great PurgeGreat Purge
The Great Purge was a series of campaigns of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union orchestrated by Joseph Stalin from 1936 to 1938...
in 1937-1938. Significant executions of notable Belarusian intellectuals and politicians have been made in the night between 29 and 30 October 1937 and related to the fabricated Case of the Union of Liberation of Belarus
Case of the Union of Liberation of Belarus
The Case of the Union of Liberation of Belarus was a political and criminal case initiated by the GPU of the Belarusian Soviet Republic against several Belarusian scientists and culture activists, which was a part of a wave of Soviet repressions in Belarus in 1929 - 1931...
in 1930.
West Belarus
West Belarus is the name used in reference to the territory of modern Belarus which belonged to the Second Polish Republic between 1919 and 1939. The area of West Belarus was annexed into the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic following staged elections soon after the Nazi-Soviet Invasion of...
after its annexation to the USSR, when thousands of kulak
Kulak
Kulaks were a category of relatively affluent peasants in the later Russian Empire, Soviet Russia, and early Soviet Union...
i, priests, social and political leaders, former Polish officials and osadniki were either exterminated or forcibly resettled to Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan , officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Ranked as the ninth largest country in the world, it is also the world's largest landlocked country; its territory of is greater than Western Europe...
, Siberia
Siberia
Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...
and other regions of the USSR.
The repressions have largely stopped after the death of Joseph Stalin in 1953.
The exact number of people who became victims to Soviet repressions in Belarus is hard to determine because the archives of the KGB
KGB
The KGB was the commonly used acronym for the . It was the national security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 until 1991, and was the premier internal security, intelligence, and secret police organization during that time.The State Security Agency of the Republic of Belarus currently uses the...
in Belarus remain inaccessible to researchers.
Number of victims
According to incomplete calculations, about 600,000 people fell victim to Soviet repressions in Belarus between 1917 and 1953. Other estimates put the number at higher than 1.4 million persons., of which 250,000 were sentenced by judicial or executed by extrajudicial bodies (dvoikas, troikasNKVD troika
NKVD troika or Troika, in Soviet Union history, were commissions of three persons who convicted people without trial. These commissions were employed as an instrument of extrajudicial punishment introduced to circumvent the legal system with a means for quick execution or imprisonment...
, special commissions of the OGPU, NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
, MGB
MGB
The abbreviation MGB may refer to:* Mathematical Gymnasium Belgrade, special school, elementary and high school, for gifted in areas of mathematics, physics, and ICT, under University of Belgrade umbrella...
). Excluding those sentenced in the 1920s-1930s, over 250,000 Belarusians were deported as kulak
Kulak
Kulaks were a category of relatively affluent peasants in the later Russian Empire, Soviet Russia, and early Soviet Union...
s or kulak family members in regions outside the Belarusian Soviet Republic.
358,686 persons believed to be victims of Soviet repressions were sentenced to death in Belarus in 1917—1953, according to historian Vasil Kushner.
Overall, around 200,000 victims of Soviet political repressions were rehabilitated
Rehabilitation (Soviet)
Rehabilitation in the context of the former Soviet Union, and the Post-Soviet states, was the restoration of a person who was criminally prosecuted without due basis, to the state of acquittal...
in Belarus between 1954 and 2000.
Science
According to Kushner, in the 1930s, only 26 Belarusian academicians and 6 correspondent members of the Belarusian Science Academy were unaffected by repressions. Of 139 PhD students (aspirants) in Belarus as of 1934, only six people escaped execution during the repressions. According to Kushner, the Soviet repressions virtually stopped any humanitiesHumanities
The humanities are academic disciplines that study the human condition, using methods that are primarily analytical, critical, or speculative, as distinguished from the mainly empirical approaches of the natural sciences....
research in Belarus.
According to the Belarusian-Swedish historian Andrej Kotljarchuk, in the 1930s the Soviets either physically exterminated or banned from further research 32 historians from Minsk
Minsk
- Ecological situation :The ecological situation is monitored by Republican Center of Radioactive and Environmental Control .During 2003–2008 the overall weight of contaminants increased from 186,000 to 247,400 tons. The change of gas as industrial fuel to mazut for financial reasons has worsened...
with their works being also excluded from libraries. According to Kotljarchuk, the Soviet authorities thereby physically destroyed the Belarusian school of history studies of that time.
Literature
According historian Leanid MarakouLeanid Marakou
Leanid Marakou — a Belarusian journalist, writer and historian-encyclopedist.- Biography :...
, of approximately 540—570 writers who had been published in Belarus in the 1920s and 1930s, not less than 440—460 (80%) became victims of Soviet repression. This number includes Todar Kliashtorny, Andrej Mryj and many others. Including those forced to leave Belarus, no less than 500 (90%) of published Belarusian writers fell victim to the repressions, a quarter of the total number of writers persecuted by the state at this time in the entire USSR.
At the same time, according to Marakou, in Ukraine only 35% to 40% of writers have been victims to repressions, in Russia the number is below 15%.
Medicine
A total of 1520 Belarusian medical specialists have become victims of repressions, this includes anout 500 doctors, over 200 nurses, almost 600 veterinarians, several hundreds of family members that have been sentenced within the same legal cases.Notable victims of Soviet repressions in Belarus
- Zmicier ZhylunovichZmicier ZhylunovichZmicier Zhylunovich was Belarusian poet, writer and journalist known under pen name Tsishka Hartny , and a political leader...
, poet, writer and journalist, the first leader of the Soviet Socialist Republic of Belarus, arrested during the Great PurgeGreat PurgeThe Great Purge was a series of campaigns of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union orchestrated by Joseph Stalin from 1936 to 1938...
and has committed suicide in prison in 1937 - Branisłaŭ Taraškievič, linguist, translator and West BelarusWest BelarusWest Belarus is the name used in reference to the territory of modern Belarus which belonged to the Second Polish Republic between 1919 and 1939. The area of West Belarus was annexed into the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic following staged elections soon after the Nazi-Soviet Invasion of...
ian politician, executed in 1938 - Vaclaw Lastowski, literature historian, member of the Belarusian Science Academy, former prime minister of the Belarusian Democratic Republic, executed in 1938
- Adam StankievičAdam StankievičAdam Stankievič was a Belarusian Roman Catholic priest, politician and writer. Stankievič was one of ideologists of the Belarusian Christian democratic movement in the early 20th century....
, Roman Catholic priest, Christian democratic politician in West Belarus, died in a concentration camp in 1949
Modern commemoration
In late 1980s the influential pro-democracy and pro-independence movement in Belarus (the Belarusian Popular Front) has been largely inspired by the PerestroikaPerestroika
Perestroika was a political movement within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union during 1980s, widely associated with the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev...
and by the findings of graves on the former Soviet execution site in Kurapaty near Minsk.
Unlike in neighbouring countries, the authorities of the Republic of Belarus under president Aliaksandr Lukashenka give only limited access to state archives related to Stalinist repressions and do not commemorate the victims of Communism on a governmental level.
The democratic opposition close to the Conservative Christian Party
Conservative Christian Party
The Conservative Christian Party of the Belarusian People's Front , is a political party in Belarus, that opposes the government of president Alexander Lukashenko...
, the revived Belarusian Christian Democracy
Belarusian Christian Democracy
The Belarusian Christian Democracy is a political movement in Belarus that was created at the beginning of the 20th century and is now being revived by several politicians.- Before World War II :...
and Partyja BNF commemorate the victims of the Soviet regime on 29 and 30 October, the day of a mass execution of Belarusian writers in 1937, and on the traditional ancestors commemoration day (Dziady
Dziady
Dziady was an ancient Slavic feast to commemorate the dead. Literally, the word is translated as "Grandfathers". It was held twice every year . During the feast the ancient Slavs organized libations and ritual meals...
) in early November.
See also
- 1937 mass execution of Belarusians1937 mass execution of BelarusiansOctober 29-30, 1937 executions in Belarus refers to a mass extermination of Belarusian writers, artists and statespeople by Communist authorities. This event marks the peak of the Great Purge and repressions in the Soviet-controlled East Belarus....
- Case of the Union of Liberation of BelarusCase of the Union of Liberation of BelarusThe Case of the Union of Liberation of Belarus was a political and criminal case initiated by the GPU of the Belarusian Soviet Republic against several Belarusian scientists and culture activists, which was a part of a wave of Soviet repressions in Belarus in 1929 - 1931...