Border Agreement Between Poland and The USSR of 16 August 1945 - World War II Partitions

World War II Partitions

The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939 provided for the partition of the Second Polish Republic between the USSR and Nazi Germany. Following the corresponding invasions, a new border was drawn up, though based on the Curzon Line, deviated west of it in several regions. Most notably, was the Belastok Voblast, that was added to the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic, although most of the region was populated by Poles.

After Germany's invasion of the USSR, the territory in question was also re-partitioned by the Nazis. Ukraine and Belarus were administered by the occupation Ostland and Reichskommissariat Ukraine Reichskommissariats. Galician territory east of the 1939 border and the Belastok Voblast plus adjacent territory to the east of this were transformed respectively into the Distrikt Galizien and Bezirk Bialystok, and subjugated directly to the Reich.

Following the Soviet Union's liberation of Ukraine and Belarus, in 1943/1944 the Tehran and Yalta discussed upon the future of the Polish-Soviet borders, and the Allied leaders recognised the Soviet right to the territory east of the 1939 border. However, after the liberation of Western Ukraine and Belarus in summer of 1944, a Polish committee formed in the town of Sapotskin sent a letter to Moscow asking that they remain part of Poland. Stalin agreed, and on 29th of September, administration of 17 (of the 23) districts of Belastok Voblast (including the city of Bialystok) and an additional three (Siemiatycze, Hajnówka and Kleszczele) of the Brest Voblast was passed to the Polish Committee of National Liberation from the BSSR.

In October 1944 these were joined by a further transfer of Lubaczów, Horyniec, Laszki, Uhnów and Sieniawa raions of the Lviv Oblast from the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. In March 1945, an additional batch of land, the Bieszczady, Lesko, and most of Przemyśl raions(including Przemyśl city) were transferred to Poland from the Drohobych Oblast of Ukraine to the now Provisional Government of the Republic of Poland.

Soon afterwards World War II finished, and as the Provisional Government continued to transfer administration from military to civil bodies, it also finalised its new borders with its neighbours, and in particular, the Soviet Union. On 16th of August 1945, the border agreement was officially signed by Edward Osóbka-Morawski, on behalf of the Provisional Government of National Unity and Vyacheslav Molotov, the Soviet Minister of Foreign affairs. The exchange of ratified documents occurred on 5 February 1946 in Warsaw, and from that date the agreement was in force.