Operation North
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Operation North (
USSR Ministry of State Security[1] to the massive deportation of Jehovah's Witnesses[2] and their families to Siberia in the Soviet Union on 1 and 8 April 1951.[3][4][5][6]
Background
There were almost no Jehovah's Witnesses in the
anti-Soviet. Members of religious groups, including Jehovah's Witnesses, qualified as religious elements which were considered a potential source of danger by the communist regime.[7][8] In November 1950, Viktor Abakumov reported a plan to deport them to Stalin, and Stalin suggested that the deportation should occur in March–April 1951.[3]
Implementation
On February 19, 1951, Abakumov delivered a secret notice to Stalin,[9] detailing plans for the deportations of Jehovah's Witnesses to Tomsk Oblast and Irkutsk Oblast. It said, in particular, that during 1947–1950, 1048 Jehovah's Witnesses leaders and activists had been arrested, 5 underground print houses had been uncovered, and large amounts of printed matter confiscated. The deportees were permitted to take a maximum of 150 kilograms of property, packed within two hours; the remaining property was to be confiscated "to cover the obligations of the deportees before the state".[4] Abakumov's notice listed the following planned numbers of deportees:[10]
- Total number: 8576 persons (3048 families), including:
- Ukrainian SSR— 6140 persons (2020 families);
- Byelorussian SSR— 394 persons (153 families);
- Moldavian SSR— 1675 persons (670 families);
- Latvian SSR— 52 persons (27 families);
- Lithuanian SSR— 76 persons (48 families);
- Estonian SSR— 250 persons (130 families).
On March 3, 1951, the
special settlers".[3] From the Moldavian SSR, there were 2,617 persons (723 families) deported on the night of March 31 to April 1, 1951.[12][13][7][8] In total, 9,973 persons were deported from the whole country.[11][14]
Amnesty and exculpation
On September 30, 1965, a decree (no. 4020-1U
Notable deportees
- Family of Zinaida Greceanîi, former prime Minister of Moldova
See also
References and notes
- ^ "Operation North" (in Russian)
- Pavel Polyan notes that the Soviets were probably unaware of the existence of another Russian religious group which also had the same name in Russian
- ^ a b c Валерий Пасат ."Трудные страницы истории Молдовы (1940–1950)". Москва: Изд. Terra, 1994 (in Russian)
- ^ a b c d "Christian Believers Were Persecuted by All Totalitarian Regimes" Prava Lyudini ("Rights of a Person"), the newspaper of a Ukrainian human rights organization, Kharkiv, December 2001 (in Russian)
- ^ Charles King, The Moldovans: Romania, Russia, and the Politics of Culture, Hoover Institution Press, 2000, p.96
- Memorial Society(in Russian)
- ^ ISBN 978-973-50-1836-8, p. 754 (in Romanian)
- ^ a b Elena Şişcanu, Basarabia sub ergimul bolşevic (1940–1952), București, Ed. Semne, 1998, p.111 (in Romanian)
- ^ Titled: "On the need to evict members of the anti-Soviet sect of Jehovah's Witnesses and members of their families from the western regions of Ukraine and Belarus, the Moldavian, Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian SSR." Записка МГБ СССР "О необходимости выселения из западных областей Украины и Белоруссии, Молдавской, Латвийской, Литовской и Эстонской ССР участников антисоветской секты иеговистов и членов их семей".
- ^ "Recalling Operation North", by Vitali Kamyshev, "Русская мысль", Париж, N 4363, 26 April 2001 (in Russian)
- ^ a b c d e "A Survey of Judicial Practice of the Jehovah's Witnesses Cases", G.A.Krylova
- ^ Charles King, The Moldovans: Romania, Russia, and the Politics of Culture, p. 96
- ^ Andrei Brezianu and Vlad Spânu, The A to Z of Moldova, p. 118
- ^ Moscow Press Conference on 70th Anniversary of Operation North. Deportation of Nearly 10,000 of Jehovah's Witnesses to Siberia
