The wall painting will pay homage to Maj. Mieczysław Słowikowski, Poland’s top spy in North Africa during the war, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
Commissioned by the Polish embassy in Rabat, the mural is slated for unveiling on January 23, officials said.
The vast painting will document Operation Torch, the Allied invasion of French North Africa during World War II, and honour the man who helped make it a success, reporters were told.
The mural will feature and a 17-metre-high likeness of the Polish superspy, alongside a map of the Allied landings and depictions of figures such as the US president at the time, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the British prime minister, Winston Churchill, according to officials.
Operation Torch
The 1942 Operation Torch represented the first step towards a decisive Allied victory in World War II, the PAP news agency noted.
The operation featured some 65,000 British and US troops who landed in Morocco and Algeria on the French North African coast on November 8, 1942.
It enabled the Allies to drive German and Italian forces out of North Africa and subsequently invade Sicily and the Italian peninsula, according to PAP.
Operation Torch achieved success in part thanks to the work of Maj. Słowikowski’s Intelligence Agency Africa, which supplied the British and American armed forces with over 1,200 spy reports about the situation in Morocco and Algeria, then part of pro-Nazi German Vichy France, officials said.
Maj. Mieczysław Słowikowski (right). Photo: MINISTRY OF INFORMATION SECOND WORLD WAR FOREIGN OFFICIAL COLLECTION, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Proposed by the Polish embassy in Morocco, the mural is being created by Polish artists, in association with the US embassy as well as the administration of Morocco’s Rabat-Salé-Kénitra region and the city of Kenitra, the PAP news agency reported.
The project has been co-sponsored by the Polish and US embassies, among other partners, it said.
(pm/gs)
Source: PAP, historynet.com