Soviet Responsibility at Katyn: pro and con

[Oleg Grigoryev]

Ok I will read the link.

a) I don't understand what you meant by “barred” .

This:

http://translate.google.pl/translate?hl ... rmd%3Divns

OK -but that is not Russia specific.

[Piotr Kapuscinski]

I don't know which Russian specific regulation says about prescription of genocide crime. Prof. Symonides writes that you have prescription of genocide, I didn't check where exactly and after how many years it is barred.

[Oleg Grigoryev]

I don't know which Russian specific regulation says about prescription of genocide crime. Prof. Symonides writes that you have prescription of genocide, I didn't check where exactly and after how many years it is barred.

Article 357 of the Russian penal code says nothing about barring.

As you expert noted though

Ale jeszcze raz podkreślę, że na gruncie prawa międzynarodowego Katyń nie spełnia wymogów stawianych przez prawnomiędzynarodową definicję ludobójstwa.

http://wyborcza.pl/1,76842,9411990,Dlac ... z1Jdib3TgW

[michael mills]

It is often overlooked that much of the Lithuanian officer corps (and perhaps those of Latvia and Estonia?) was also taken to the USSR in 1940 and later executed. Katyn was the biggest part of a pattern that embraced more than Poles.

he historical fact is that the Lithuanian Army was incorporated holus-bolus into the Red Army in July 1940, as an army corps. The same thing probably happened with the Latvian and Estonian armies.

On 21 June 1941, the Lithuanian units of the Red Army revolted en masse, led by their officers, and attacked the Red Army detachments in Lithuania, forcing the flight of the Soviet administration. The revolt of the Lithuanian units enabled the German Army to walk in on the following day with minimal resistance from the Red Army, which had already begun its withdrawal.

When the german forces entered Lithuania, they found local Jews already hanging from the trees. They had been strung up Lithuanian mutineers and other anti-Soviet resisters as soon as the Red Army fled.

[David Thompson]

Gentlemen -- The topic under discussion is the evidence for or against Soviet responsibility for the Katyn forest massacre. Please stay on it, and try not to wander off into the bushes.

[henryk]

http://www.thenews.pl/international/art ... uote]Katyn must be termed ‘genocide’, say politicians
19.04.2011 12:12
A group of over thirty politicians and journalists have called on President Bronisław Komorowski to issue a declaration that would confirm Poland’s stand whereby the Katyń massacre of Polish officers in 1940 in Soviet Russia is termed as a genocide.

The appeal - signed by, among others, former deputy speaker of parliament Marek Jurek, MEP Konrad Szymański, former MEP and prominent historian Wojciech Roszkowski and director of the Warsaw Rising Museum Jan Ołdakowski - follows an opinion by presidential adviser Roman Kuzniar expressed in a radio interview last week that Katyn was a war crime rather than an act of genocide.

“I realize that many Poles find it difficult to accept but the Katyn crime does not come under the definition of genocide as formulated in UN conventions,” he said.

In their appeal to the President, Polish politicians and journalists write that Katyn was genocide both as an extermination of Polish intelligentsia and as an element of the Soviet Union’s genocidal policies in the territories seized from Poland after 17 September 1939.

The appeal stresses that the notion ‘genocide’ in reference to Katyn was used not only by Polish state organs and public opinion but also by a team of experts of the Supreme Military Prosecutor of the Russian Federation in 1993.

Former Chairman of the National Remembrance Institute and now Civic Platform senator Leon Kieres told the Polish Press Agency that the goal of the Katyn massacre was an elimination of Polish elites, which was to result in an enslavement of the Polish nation, and therefore it was a crime of genocide. Professor Kieres recalled that after World War II the Russians themselves referred to Katyń as genocide when trying to make Nazi Germany responsible for the crime.

According to the authors of the appeal to the President, belittling the importance of truth about Soviet communism does not serve to enhance Polish-Russian dialogue. (mk)[/quote]

[Piotr Kapuscinski]

The problem with a "war crime" is that Poland was not at war with the Soviet Union in 1940 / 1941.

Thus probably a crime against humanity comes into play. BTW - recently a new grave of those from the "Ukrainian Katyn List" has been discovered in Ukraine. Around 1,000 victims - all shot in the back of the head.

They may be also some of Polish civilians who were murdered by NKVD in 1941.

[Lorsa]

A contiuation of this thread:
OK, let's suppose they were sentenced to 5 years without the right to write ( ;] ). Where were they?

There had been no such harsh punishment in SU. It had been implemented only for prisoners sentenced to death.

[spgapi]

The Katyn testimony of Friedrich Ahrens

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=56992

[David Thompson]

An opinion post from bolchevik, which added nothing of informational value to the thread, was removed by this moderator - DT.

bolchevik -- The section rules are posted for all to see at http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=53962. Please review them if you plan to post here.

[David Thompson]

Another rubbish post from bolchevik, which required the readers to look through a lengthy and polemical collection of posts on another forum, was removed by this moderator - DT.

bolchevik -- I have already directed your attention to our rules. If you don't plan to comply with them, you will have a short posting career here.

1. Discussions

The research sections of the forum are meant for persons who are fairly well-informed on the topics being discussed, and our discussions are not directed at the lowest common denominator of readership. Rural customs of discourse, such as feigned ignorance, pettifogging, playing at peek-a-boo, or "stonewalling" denials of facts well-known to most informed persons, are strongly disfavored here.

The object of the research sections of the forum is to exchange information, not to engage in dim wrangling as a form of diversion. Our readers are intelligent people, who have already taken the time to inform themselves on the topic under discussion and don't have a lot of time to waste playing games. Shrill and highly polemical posts are also strongly disfavored.

http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=53962

[Piotr Kapuscinski]

(...) BTW - recently a new grave of those from the "Ukrainian Katyn List" has been discovered in Ukraine. Around 1,000 victims - all shot in the back of the head.

They may be also some of Polish civilians who were murdered by NKVD in 1941.

Here some other victims found in 2006:

[henryk]

Progress from Russia:
http://www.thenews.pl/1/9/Artykul/58895 ... bilitation project ready for WWII Katyn victims
Peter Gentle 21.11.2011 15:03
Russia is set to exonerate the victims of the WWII Katyn Crime, in which 22,500 Poles were executed by Soviet Secret Police. “According to anonymous sources within the Interfax news agency, the changes in the law have already been prepared,” Polish Radio's Moscow correspondent Maciej Jastrzebski reported on Monday.

In February this year, Russian ambassador in Warsaw Alexander Alekseyev declared that Moscow would rehabilitate the Katyn victims. President Dimitri Medvedev appointed a special team of lawyers to handle the matter. Under Russian law, the process would clear the executed men of any stain on their honour.

Although Moscow officially admitted guilt for the crime in 1990, the process of rehabilitation is normally applied to those unjustly sentenced in court, which provided a stumbling block as there was no court sentence for the Poles, a large portion of whom were reserve army officers.

Previously, in 2004, Russian military prosecutors broke off an investigation into the massacre, citing that rehabilitation was no longer possible because the executioners themselves were no longer alive and that there is no official documentation on the death of each individual victim. (nh/pg)[/quote]
http://rt.com/news/line/2011-11-21/#id2 ... ote]Russia, Poland ‘closer’ to decision on rehabilitation of Katyn Massacre victims
­Russian judicial experts have prepared a package of amendments to the legislation to solve the problem of the rehabilitation of Polish citizens executed by the Soviet security police, NKVD, in Katyn in April-May 1940. The two countries are closer to the solution as the political decision had already been made, Interfax reports, citing its source. The current Russian legislation does not make it possible to reconsider earlier judicial decisions in the case, the source said. But he said other options for the rehabilitation are possible that are not connected with the need for a new investigation.[/quote]

[Art]

the process of rehabilitation is normally applied to those unjustly sentenced in court, which provided a stumbling block as there was no court sentence for the Poles, a large portion of whom were reserve army officers

Nope, the law says explicitly about sentences of "extrajudicial" organs and rehabilitation was in fact applied to those sentences. The stumbling block is actually a complete absence of any sentences at all.

Previously, in 2004, Russian military prosecutors broke off an investigation into the massacre, citing that rehabilitation was no longer possible

Rehabilitation and investigation are different things. The death of members of organs responsible for sentences is not a legal impediment to rehabilitation, of course.

[waldzee]

It is often overlooked that much of the Lithuanian officer corps (and perhaps those of Latvia and Estonia?) was also taken to the USSR in 1940 and later executed. Katyn was the biggest part of a pattern that embraced more than Poles.

he historical fact is that the Lithuanian Army was incorporated holus-bolus into the Red Army in July 1940, as an army corps. The same thing probably happened with the Latvian and Estonian armies.

On 21 June 1941, the Lithuanian units of the Red Army revolted en masse, led by their officers, and attacked the Red Army detachments in Lithuania, forcing the flight of the Soviet administration. The revolt of the Lithuanian units enabled the German Army to walk in on the following day with minimal resistance from the Red Army, which had already begun its withdrawal.

When the german forces entered Lithuania, they found local Jews already hanging from the trees. They had been strung up Lithuanian mutineers and other anti-Soviet resisters as soon as the Red Army fled.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Breath deep, Mr Mills.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... Katyn.html

Doesn't blame the Nazis.
Lithuania is a very long way from Smolesk.
& your sentence, written in haste, does not make sense.
That said, there is a proper terminology to be used in respect to the dead. A body is lynched, not strung up or hanging from the trees. While exceptiosn are made for EASL posters, all native English speakers have a duty of care.