Conservative Christian Party commemorates 1920 Slutsk anti-Bolshevik uprising :: Charter'97 :: News

Minsk, 28 November. Activists of Belarus` nationalist Conservative Christian Party (CCP) on November 27 marked the 84th anniversary of the Slutsk anti-Bolshevik uprising by touring the places where the main events of the uprising occurred in the fall of 1920.

They laid wreaths and flowers at the graves of rebels in the village of Krasnaya Sloboda, formerly Vyznya, where the bloodiest battle had taken place between the rebels and the Bolsheviks` 27th Omsk Division, a third of which were Chinese volunteers. They also visited the villages of Grozov and Semezhevo, also former battle scenes.

More than 80 CCP members marched in a procession along the center of the city of Slutsk, displaying historically national white-red-white flags and Pahonya emblem, to the building of the local history museum, the CCP press office told BelaPAN.

In that building, which housed the local Uezd Gentry Assembly in the pre-Soviet era, an assembly of representatives of localities in the Slutsk uezd proclaimed the uezd "part of the Belarusian National Republic," and elected a Slutsk Belarusian Rada, which, as the Polish troops` retreated, started forming a Slutsk brigade to repulse the Red Army. The brigade consisted of two regiments and had some 10,000 rebels.

At a commemorative rally held in front of the museum on Saturday, CCP Deputy Chairman Sergei Popkov and other party leaders emphasized the great importance of the Slutsk uprising for the defense of the country`s independence.

The gathering also heard an address from Zenon Poznyak, the CCP`s emigre leader who, in particular, said, "The struggle of the Slutsk army gives us an example of a genuine fight for the Fatherland, because patriots defy the strength of the enemy while defending the homeland."
The Slutsk uprising broke out on November 1, 1920. Appeals by the government of the Belarusian National Republic to the Western Powers and the United States for military aid were left with no response. The Soviet government, faced with a mass revolt in Belarus, signed an armistice with Poland to free its hands for more effective suppression. The armistice allowed the Soviet government to transfer units from the Polish front and use them against the rebels. As a result, the uprising was suppressed by the end of December 1920.