The lecture will focus on the situation of the Polish minority in the Soviet Union between 1935 and 1938, a period of intense repression culminating in the NKVD’s Polish Operation. Based on materials from the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and military intelligence, the situation of Poles in the USSR will be presented, as seen through the eyes of representatives of the Second Polish Republic. The actions of Polish diplomatic missions and their cooperation with intelligence, the Polish government’s attitude towards compatriots in the USSR, and how Poles perceived the reactions of the Warsaw authorities to their persecutions and deportations will be discussed.
Robert Kuśnierz is a professor at the Institute of History, Pomeranian University in Słupsk. He defended his doctorate at Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin in 2004. He completed his habilitation at the Tadeusz Manteuffel Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw in 2015. He specializes in the history of the Soviet Union in the interwar period, and the history of diplomacy and military intelligence of the Second Polish Republic in the eastern direction.
