”We are opening the exhibition dedicated to the Soldau concentration camp established by the Germans. It is a special occasion since 78 years ago the Płock Bishop Leon Wetmański died there. The Soldau camp is an important place of extermination for the Polish clergy,”said the IPN’s President.

”Out of the 130 imprisoned ones, 88 priests, monks and and nuns were murdered. The mortality rate in this category of the Soldau prisoners was higher than in Dachau and Auschwitz,” he added.

The event was also attended by Prof. Mirosław Golon, Director of the IPN’s Gdańsk Office, who emphasized that the crimes committed in this camp are part of the Pomeranian Crime of 1939. In this context, he reminded that recently the IPN had published the educational portfolio "Pomeranian Crime 1939" and launched the educational webpage www.zbrodniapomorska1939.pl.

” Historians estimate that as a result of German repressions, a dozen thousand people were killed in Soldau. Among others, the representatives of the Polish national elite of northern Mazovia, mentally and physically disabled people as well as Jews were perished in the camp,” stressed Prof. Golon.

The exhibition was prepared by the IPN’s researchers: Dr Anna Jagodzińska and Bartosz Januszewski, who presented the participants with the historical outline of the Soldau extermination camp.

The opening ceremony was also attended by family members of those repressed, representatives of authorities. Among the honourable guests, there were Patryk Kozłowski, Director of the Muzeum Pogranicza in Działdowo, Prof. Wiesław Wysocki, reviewer of the exhibition, and Zenon Gajewski, President of the Stowarzyszenie Odnowy Chrześcijańskiej „Pamięć i Tożsamość” [Association of Christian Renewal ”Remembrance and Identity”].