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|---|---|
 Naliboki self-defense leaders in a meeting with a Soviet NKVD officer (far left) prior to being massacred | |
| Location | Naliboki German-occupied Poland |
| Date | May 8, 1943 |
| Weapons | Automatic and semi-automatic weapons |
| Deaths | 129 |
| Victims | Poles |
| Perpetrators | Soviet |
The Naliboki massacre (Template:Lang-pl) was the mass killing of 129 Poles, including women and children, by units of Soviet on 8 May 1943 in the urban settlement of Naliboki in German-occupied Poland (now modern-day Belarus). Before the 1939 Nazi-Soviet invasion of Poland, Naliboki belonged to Stołpce County, Nowogródek Voivodeship, in eastern Poland.
Background
Prior to 1939, Naliboki had some 4,000 residents, including several hundred Jews, who were driven out of the town following the German advance during Operation Barbarossa.
Following Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany, the Soviet resistance forces operated in the Naliboki Forest behind the German front lines of eastern Poland. Their NKVD leaders were sent in by Moscow headquarters in 1942 with full access to military hardware. The local members came from the Red Army soldiers of all ethnicities trapped into an encirclement by German troops, and pro-Soviet Belarusians as well as Ukrainians. All daily provisions were forcefully acquired from settlements whose inhabitants were treated as enemies. The killings of peasants in order to inflict terror during acquisitions began in 1943 (in Kamień, Derewno, Borowikowszczyzna, Dziagwie, Rodziewszczyzna, etc). Naliboki was one of the settlements usually raided by them. As a result, in August 1942 a self-defence unit was formed in the village by the order of Germans, and at the same time the police station in the settlement was removed.
Some of the members of the self-defense were members of Home Army, who used this membership as a cover. Soviet partisans were aware of this, and in March and April 1943 they arranged two meetings with the Polish self-defence leaders. During the talks the Soviet partisans insisted the Poles joined them, but the POles refused. However an agreement was signed with the Poles represented by Eugeniusz Klimowicz, about mutual truce and fight against robbers hiding in the forest. However the Soviet partisans violated the truce.
The massacre
On the night of May 8–9, 1943, the Soviet partisans raided Naliboki from the depths of the Naliboki Forest. A few of the Soviet attackers, including one political officer, were killed by the defenders. Polish men were pulled from their homes, and then shot individually or in small groups. Many farmhouses were set on fire. The mass looting followed. Also killed during the Soviet attack were three Polish women, several teenagers and a ten-year-old boy. The town's church was set on fire along with the public school, fire station, and the post office. The raid took two to three hours. The Soviet commandant delivered a report to NKVD about the killing of 250 people, the capture of weapons, round up of 100 cows and 78 horses, and the destruction of a German garrison. In reality the number of victims was lower (now estimated at 129); no Germans were present and none killed; only one Belarusian auxiliary policeman happened to be sleeping in the town during the night of the attack.
The investigation into the Naliboki massacre was launched by the Institute of National Remembrance on 20 March 2001 in Łódź, along with the investigation into the Koniuchy massacre committed in the same prewar Nowogródek Voivodeship of north-eastern Poland.
Mistaken association with Bielski partisans
Some of the residents said they recognized former Jewish residents of the town among the attackers. Some have associated these Jews with the Bielski partisans, a well known Jewish unit which operated in the Naliboki forest, with the release of the movie Defiance in 2008 further prompting such calls. However, members of the unit denied they took part, the unit moved to Naliboki only in August 1943, and the unit does not appear in the Soviet documentation which specifies that the "Stalin" brigade carried out the operation.
See also
References
- ^ Anna Gałkiewicz, prokurator Oddziałowej KŚZpNP w Łodzi (14 May 2003). "Omówienie dotychczasowych ustaleń w śledztwach w sprawach o zbrodnie w Nalibokach i Koniuchach". Spotkanie Klubu Historycznego im. gen. Stefana Roweckiego - "Grota" w Instytucie Pamięci Narodowej. Warszawa: Komisja Ścigania Zbrodni przeciwko Narodowi Polskiemu, KŚZpNP. Archived from the original on April 29, 2009.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|deadurl=ignored (|url-status=suggested) (help) - "Wyborcza.pl". wyborcza.pl. Retrieved 2018-03-05.
- "«Еврейские партизаны» не имели меры в своей необоснованной злости и в грабежах — Інстытут беларускай гісторыі і культуры" (in Russian). inbelhist.org. Retrieved 2017-10-21.
- ^ IPN (November 2013). "Śledztwo w sprawie zbrodni popełnionych przez partyzantów radzieckich na żołnierzach Armii Krajowej i ludności cywilnej na terenie powiatów Stołpce i Wołożyn woj. nowogródzkie (S 17/01/Zk)". Śledztwa w biegu - Zbrodnie komunistyczne. Instytut Pamieci Narodowej. Retrieved 25 January 2014.
- ^ Kazimierz Krajewski. "Ginęli, ratując Żydów" [Dying while Rescuing Jews] (PDF). „Opor”? „Odwet”? Czy po prostu „polityka historyczna”? O Żydach w partyzantce sowieckiej na Kresach II RP. NR 3 (98), March 2009. Warsaw: IPN Bulletin: 99–120. ISSN 1641-9561. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-02-22.
{{cite journal}}:|volume=has extra text (help); Unknown parameter|deadurl=ignored (|url-status=suggested) (help) - Geraldine Bereziuk Lowrey (March 5, 2015). "Book Review". The Last Day of Naliboki By Mieczyslaw Klimowicz (American Literary Press, 2009). The Am-Pol Eagle, Cheektowaga, NY.
At the time, Mieczyslaw Klimowicz, the son of Eugeniusz Klimowicz, was in his teens.
- ^ IPN (1 March 2002), Investigation Reports on Koniuchy and Naliboki, Institute of National Memory, retrieved 19 January 2014
- Polish Investigators Tie World War II Partisans to Naliboki Massacre, Haaretz / Forward, 14 Aug 2008
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