On 27 April 2021 at 11:00 a.m the President of the Institute of National Remembrance, Jarosław Szarek Ph.D., officially opened the "Order No. 00485. Anti-Polish Operation of the NKVD in Soviet Ukraine 1937-1938" exhibition in Pułtusk. The event took place at the "Dom Polonii" castle in Pułtusk with the participation of Krzysztof Łachmański, Deputy President of the "Wspólnota Polska" Assosiation, Michał Kisiel, the Director of "Dom Polonii" [Polonia Castle], Deputy Director of the IPN Archive, Mariusz Żuławnik Ph.D.,Paweł Zielony, the co-author of the exhibition as well as MP Henryk Kowalczyk. The event was also attended by repatriates from the East whose families were deported by the Soviets to Kazachstan in 1936.
On 26 March 2018, the Institute of National Remembrance concluded an agreement with the State Regional Archives in Odessa, Vinnytsia and Khmelnytsky in Ukraine. The agreement provides Polish archivists with access to thousands of documents regarding the crimes committed against Poles in the years 1937–38 in the Soviet Union, as part of the so-called Polish Operation of the NKVD. Within two years, on the basis of the agreement, the IPN Archive has received over 660,000 copies of files documenting the scale and course of the repressions committed on Poles in the Ukrainian SSR during the Great Terror.
The Order No. 00485. Anti-Polish Operation of the NKVD in Soviet Ukraine 1937-1938 exhibition, presented in several cities around the world, incl. in Warsaw, Kiev and New York is also the result of the above mentioned cooperation.
The "Order No. 00485. Anti-Polish Operation of the NKVD in Soviet Ukraine 1937-1938"exhibition was prepared by the Institute of National Remembrance basing on the above mentioned archival materials and photographs from the State Regional Archives – in Odessa, Vinnytsia and Khmelnytskyi as well as documents obtained from the Memorial Society and the Center for Polish-Russian Dialogue and Understanding.
The exhibition has received the Patronage of the President of the Republic of Poland Andrzej Duda on the 100th anniversary of Poland regaining its independence.
The exhibition consists of 16 boards presenting the fate of people persecuted as part of the "Polish operation" carried out by the NKVD in the Soviet Union in 1937-1938, during which over 143,000 people were arrested, at least 111,000 of whom were sentenced to death. Nearly 30,000 Poles were sent to labor camps. In Ukraine alone, where the largest concentration of the Polish population in the USSR was located, 55 928 people were tried, of whom 47,327 were murdered.
The men arrested as part of the operation were accused of belonging to the Polish Military Organization, disbanded in 1921, and which allegedly carried out espionageand subversive activities for the benefit of the Second Polish Republic. Most of them were sentenced to death. The wives of "spies" or "enemies of the people" were sent for 5 to 10 years to Kazakhstan for not informing the authorities about "the counter-revolutionary espionage activities" of their husbands. Their children were often placed in orphanages or imprisoned in labor camps.
The first five boards show the situation of Poles after the Treaty of Riga and the course of the "Polish operation" in the USSR. The following ones portray the personal stories of the repressed. Additionally, 3 boards present photographs of the reenactment of arrests, interrogations and shootings.
In Ukraine the exhibition has so far been on display in:
• Khmelnytskyi – 23 November 2018
• Vinnytsia – 12 April 2019
• Odessa – 9 September 2019
• Kiev – 20 November 2019
Apart from being shown in Poland, the exhibition also reached the U.S. The Archive of the Institute of National Remembrance and the Pamięć US Association opened the "Order No. 00485. Anti-Polish Operation of the NKVD in Soviet Ukraine 1937-1938" exhibition as part of the 8th edition of the IPN’s History Point in New York. On 17 November 2019 it was presented in the church. St. Stanisław Bishop and Martyr in Manhattan, New York and was viewed at the Polish Cultural Foundation in Clark on 20 November 2019. The official opening was accompanied by lectures. Workshops for teachers of Polish students abroad dedicated to the so-called NKVD anti-Polish operation took place at the Polish Cultural Foundation in Clark.
