Polish Veteran survived Gulag, turns 103

http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2008Dec17/0,4670,EUBelarusWWIIVeteran,00.html

The above is an interesting article commemorating the life Aleksander Szekal, the last living veteran of a Polish Unit that fought against the German Army in Italy in WWII. Szekal was sent off to a Gulag to die, but when the German’s invaded Russia, Stalin decided to put such people as Szekal to better use. The gulags were apparently gleaned of Poles able to fight and Szekal’s life was saved. Rather than return to Poland after the ware, and back to prison, he became a British citizen.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, Szekal moved to Ivyanets, Belarus to be with his wife. The article concludes: “Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko speaks warmly of the Soviet era and calls the national security agency the KGB. Lukashenko’s authoritarian government has granted Szekal residency, but no accolades.

“The trial of Nazism took place at Nuremburg, and I am ready to be a witness in the trial of communism, which I hope to live to see,’ Szekal said.”

I doubt that you will, Szekal. I doubt it.

[I read the above article in my local newspaper. The only internet news agency that picked up the story, that I could find, was Fox News. ]

Yuras Kamanau, writing for the Chicago Tribune, would agree with Szekal rather than Lukashenko: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-russia-stalin_rodriguezdec17,0,2772612.story That’s encouraging.