A crowd of Polish Americans gathered in Jersey City on Sunday for a commemorative ceremony at the local Katyn Monument, created by Polish-American sculptor Andrzej Pityński.
The event marked three anniversaries: the 87th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II, the 87th anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland on September 17, 1939, and the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York.
The motto of the event was "Monuments are silent, but they teach for centuries."
The ceremony was organised by the Committee for the Protection of the Katyn Monument and Historical Objects.
Among the invited guests was Jersey City Mayor James Solomon.
Other attendees included veterans, among them 103-year-old Fryderyk Damond, Polish-American scouts, students from Polish supplementary schools, representatives of Katyn Families, clergy and members of Polish-American organisations.
The mayor highlighted the importance of the Polish-American community and paid tribute to the victims of war. He also described the Katyn Monument as an important landmark for the city.
Polish Deputy Consul Wiktor Cichocki stressed the importance of preserving the memory of the outbreak of World War II and the Soviet invasion of Poland, as well as honouring their victims.
Tadeusz Antoniak, commander-in-chief of the Polish Army Veterans’ Association in America, appealed to younger generations of Polish Americans to remember the 1939 Soviet invasion of Poland.
He recalled that his generation was not taught about the invasion or the fact that Moscow was initially an ally of Nazi Germany during the war.
Antoniak also referred to the 2010 Polish air crash near Smolensk, western Russia, in which President Lech Kaczyński and dozens of others died while travelling to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Katyn Massacre.
Bogusława Huang, head of the Committee for the Protection of the Katyn Monument and Historical Objects, discussed the historical context of the anniversaries in her speech.
Agnieszka Kasprzak, deputy head of the central organisation of Polish supplementary schools, was a co-organiser of the ceremony.
The Polish-American community and Jersey City authorities are also planning to unveil a plaque commemorating the late Jersey City Councilman Michael Yun, who was a strong supporter of efforts to preserve the Katyn Monument.
The monument is located across the Hudson River from the World Trade Center site.
Almost 3,000 people, including six Poles, died after hijacked planes slammed into the twin towers of the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, a quarter-century ago in what was the deadliest terror attack on American soil.
Nearly 22,000 Polish prisoners of war were killed in the spring of 1940 on orders from top Soviet authorities, according to historians, in what is known as the Katyn Massacre.
Moscow denied responsibility for the killings for decades, while the subject was taboo in Poland, which remained under Soviet control after the war until 1989.
(sp/gs)
Source: dzieje.pl