September 11 Digital Archive

The Katyn monument will not be moved

Title

The Katyn monument will not be moved

Source

born-digital

Media Type

article

Created by Author

yes

Described by Author

no

Date Entered

2002-08-09

VTMBH Article: Edition

30

VTMBH Article: Article Order

1

VTMBH Article: Title

The Katyn monument will not be moved

VTMBH Article: Author

Marek Tomaszewski

VTMBH Article: Publication

Nowy Dziennik / Polish Daily News

VTMBH Article: Original Language

Polish

VTMBH Article: Translator

Lukasz Bulka

VTMBH Article: Section

briefs

VTMBH Article: Blurb

VTMBH Article: Keywords

VTMBH Article: Body

A Jersey City waterfront monument honoring thousands of Polish officers killed by the Soviet Secret Police in 1939 will not be moved, decided the three board members of the Jersey City 9/11 Committee, which has the mission of building a monument on the Jersey City waterfront to memorialize the victims of the terrorist attacks.

If they decided to move the monument, I would chain myself to it and go on a hunger strike, Stanislaw Paszul, one of the original donors for the Katyn Monument told Nowy Dziennik at a meeting held Wednesday at Jersey Citys City Hall. In his speech at the meeting, Paszul said the Polish officers and soldiers were also murdered by terroristsSoviet terrorists in Katyn.

In Paszuls opinion, moving the Katyn monument to raise an obelisk commemorating the victims of the World Trade Center attacksas recently proposed by the 9/11 Committee would honor the New York tragedy at the expense of the Poles killed during World War II. Members of the 9/11 Committee understood Paszuls point of view.

Weve made a decision not to do that, said Greg Nye, the co-chairman of the committee, who is African-American, according to Paszul.

In an interview with Nowy Dziennik, Nye emphasized that the majority of the board members realized that the Katyn tragedy remains an open wound of the Polish soul and that the World Trade Center monument must be erected in another location.

The suggestion to move the Katyn monument was first mentioned on July 24, at a meeting of the Jersey City Dante Alighieri Society; many Dante Alighieri members joined the 9/11 Committee.

The committee considered building the monument at the same spot that ferries carrying people escaping Manhattan docked on the morning of September 11th. They docked right by the Katyn monument, which has been standing there for over a decade.

The monument is repulsive, one member of the Dante Society said at the Italian groups July meeting. Though the person who said it later apologized, he was removed from both organizations, said Guy Catrillo, a member of both the society and the committee.

The discussion of moving the Katyn monument was covered in the July 28th Jersey City Reporter, which caused Polish residents of the city to react.

The negotiations continued until late evening on August 6, an unnamed Polish-American woman who worked behind the scenes to resolve the conflict told Nowy Dziennik. Her stand was very clear: over my dead body. Other Poles asked the committee not to honor one tragedy at the expense of another.

Stanislaw Paszul reminded the meeting that the Katyn monument was erected over the course of two from 1988 to 1990 at the cost of $250,000. Paszul himself donated $13,000 to fund the monuments installation.

VTMBH Article: Line Breaks

1

VTMBH Article: Date

2002-08-09

VTMBH Article: Thumb

katyn-resized-2.jpg

VTMBH Article: Article File

VTMBH Article: Hit Count

112

Citation

“The Katyn monument will not be moved,” September 11 Digital Archive, accessed May 17, 2024, https://911digitalarchive.org/items/show/1650.