65 years since Stalin's deportation of Poles to Siberia

Survivors marked 65 years yesterday since Soviet occupiers began sending Poles to Siberian labour camps after signing a pact with Nazi Germany to divide up Poland. Under Soviet dictator Josef Stalin, at least 320,000 Poles from what is now Belarus, Ukraine and Lithuania were deported between February 1940 and June 1941. Historians estimate that some 20 to 30 per cent perished from forced labour in subfreezing temperatures, disease and starvation. A wreath-laying ceremony at a monument to the deportees marked the anniversary of the first transport of Poles on February 10, 1940, and survivors talked about still vivid memories.