Dr Wlodzimierz Mier-Jedrzejowicz, President of the Federation of Poles In Great Britain (ZPWB), has protested by letter to the Belarussian Ambassador in the UK concerning the recent harassment, arrest and sentence of the Andzelika Borys, who is president of The Union of Poles in Belarus (ZPB), Her arrest has also led to a strong protest from the President of Poland to the President of Belarus.
The 400,000 strong Polish population is a native ethnic minority in Belarus who have had a presence in this land since the XIVth century. They were left on the Belarusian side after the borders with Poland were forciblly moved westwards at the Yalta Conference in 1945. They are particularly numerous in the Brest region bordering modern Poland. They have been a persecuted minority in the Russian empire in the XIXth century and then in the post-war Soviet republic of Belarus and again under the curent tyranny of President Lukashenka. Attempts are made to forcibly assimilate Poles in the Belarusification of the country and the depolonisation of the Catholic Church, by curtailing their celebrations of Polish cutlure and commemoration of events in Polish history, and by seeking to split up and fine existing organizations.
The Federaion of Poles in Great Britain is an umbrella organization which has represented the main Polish organizations in the UK since 1947.
For further information please contact Wiktor Moszczynski, spokesman of the Federation of Poles in Great Britain, tel 07786471833. Our address is 240 King Street, London W6 0RF