Radio Poland marks Warsaw Uprising anniversary
PR dla Zagranicy
Victoria Bieniek
01.08.2017 12:54
Radio Poland, Polish Radio’s English language service, is reporting on the main events marking the Warsaw Uprising, a campaign to liberate Warsaw from Nazi German occupation which started on 1 August 1944.
Children on summer vacation by Warsaw's Royal Castle recreate the Kotwica (Anchor) which symbolised the Polish resistance movement in WWII. Photo: PAP/Marcin Kmieciński.
These include a traditional sounding of sirens at 5pm, the exact time that the Polish underground Home Army’s campaign to liberate Warsaw started.
The uprising was the largest military offensive by any resistance movement in Europe against Nazi German occupiers during World War II.
After 63 days, during which some 18,000 fighters and up to 200,000 civilians were killed, the uprising was put down by better equipped and more numerous German forces.
On 3 August, Radio Poland will present a documentary by public television TVP on the Wola Massacre.
Some 40,000 to 50,000 people in the western Warsaw district of Wola were killed by German Nazi troops during the early phase of the Warsaw Uprising.
Between 5 and 12 August 1944 tens of thousands of Polish civilians along with captured Home Army resistance fighters were systematically murdered in organised mass executions.
It is estimated that up to 10,000 civilians were killed in the Wola district on 5 August alone, the first day of the operation.
Most of the victims were the elderly, women and children. (vb/pk)
Source: Polskie Radio