Polacy na Łotwie w okresie okupacji sowieckiej w latach 1940–1941: represje.
Poles of Latvia during the Soviet Occupation, 1940–1941: Repression

Summary/Abstract: The paper discusses the situation of the Polish minority in Latvia under Soviet occupation from June 1940 to June 1941. The overall situation of Poles and of the repressions taken against them are outlined, including the nature and consequences thereof. Particular attention is paid to the repressions encountered by two Poles who were officers in the Latvian Army: Piotr Gaidamowicz and Jan Olszański. To the losses suffered by the Polish nation due to Soviet repressions, we should add 220–226 Latvian Poles who were arrested – mainly for patriotic activities in Polish organisations and in the service of the Latvian state, which was friendly towards Poland – and either shot or deported to remote parts of the USSR from where for various reasons they were never able to return to their homeland. Poles were the only national minority in Latvia whose members created their own resistance groups against the Soviet occupation, and in the indictments prepared against them by the Soviet apparatus of repression, this Polish national factor played a prominent role.

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