Thank you for considering S.Res.566. Unfortunately, the draft contains a false statement that is offensive to the Katyn victims and their families. Please assure that the offensive language that mirrors Stalin’s disinformation on Katyn is eliminated. As is, the resolution will do injustice to the Katyn victims, the Polish people, and Poland – long time US ally!
The sentence below falsifies history, minimizes the gravity of the Katyn crime, and offends the memory of Katyn victims:
“Whereas, the Katyn Massacre fits into a larger pattern of Communist governments … persecuting their citizens … since … 1917.”
Please replace it with:
Whereas, Katyn was aimed at eliminating the very idea of Poland, to exterminate the people and the memory of the people. Katyn presents a moral crisis to this day because the moral calculus with respect to Katyn has not been worked out. Katyn represents a marker in human history that has not yet been fully inscribed;
Also, it is time that the Katyn Massacre be named honestly and properly – not as a political crime as portrayed by Stalin – but as a crime of genocide to annihilate the Polish national group. Kindly support the following language:
Therefore, we recognize that the systematic mass murders of the Polish people, conducted pursuant to the order of March 5, 1940, issued by the Soviet Politburo, and mass deportations of Polish people from conquered lands to USSR raise to the level of the crime of genocide.
Please consider this Statement of a victim of the Katyn Operation:
http://www.librainstitute.org/ARTICLES/Lukaszewski-Statement.html