Udział Polaków w narodowym ruchu oporu na Łotwie w latach 1944–1950
Participation of Poles in the National Resistance Movement in Latvia, 1944–1950

Summary/Abstract: The Polish resistance functioned, in parallel to the Soviet one, during the German occu- pation in South-East Latvia, in the region of Latgale and the district of Ilūkste. After the second occupation of the country by the Red Army the Poles continued their activity. Both the objective of its existence (re-bulding of the independent Polish state) and the structures were the same as those under the Nazi rule. At that time the Polish resistance existed near the Latvian one. Around 30–40 people of the Polish armed unit of parti- sans led by Bronisław Worsław (Broņislavs Vorslavs) were active in the civil parish of Kaplava and also in the nearby Belarus territories (previously the eastern provinces of Poland). Also in Krāslava and Daugavpils there was an active underground organization called the Armed Forces of the Republic of Poland; in addition several smaller units of partisans, mainly consisting of Polish, existed too. It is significant that Soviet repressive institutions incriminated in their investigation for the custodies underground activities between 1942 and 1943 – during the German occupation. Apparently, the above-men- tioned activity was roused by a certain confusion of the local Soviet punitive functio- naries, because after the Second World War these institutions and their employees lacked the practice of management of these situations in the territory of Latvia. At the end of the war and after it, many inhabitants of Latvia of Polish nationality were involved also in the Latvian national resistance movement. Many of them were accordingly arrested and punished by the Soviet authorities. Likewise, in the years after the termination of the armed resistance, there were people among the Polish nationals in Latvia that dared to act against the governing regime. Undoubtedly, the most prominent was the dissident Jan Jachimowicz (Jānis, in documents – Ivan, Jahimovičs), born in 1931 in Daugavpils and arrested in March 1969.

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