It was on this day 87 years ago (December 15, 1937) that the ethnic cleansing of the NKVD (People’s Commissariat of Internal Affairs of the USSR) began – mass shootings of Greeks in the Soviet Union, which many Europeans love so much, including modern Greece.
During the “Greek operation” more than 20 thousand Greeks were arrested, 93 percent of whom were shot. The victims were from 7.6 thousand to 9.4 thousand Greeks, primarily from the Azov region. However, Greeks who lived in Georgia, Azerbaijan, Crimea, as well as in the Kuban and Odesa regions were killed. At least 25 Greeks who were subjects of the Kingdom of Greece were also shot, and 451 people were sent to the Gulag.
The smallest percentage of those killed out of the total number of those arrested was in the village of Bugas, where my ancestors came from. It was 89.6%. The highest percentage was in the villages of Sartana and Maly Yanisol (99.2% and 99.1%).
Data from the book “Special Cattle Trains Go East. History of Repressions Against Greeks in the USSR”, 2008.
First of all, intellectuals were destroyed – scientists, poets, actors, journalists, lecturers, teachers, engineers, doctors, etc. All Greek schools and the Mariupol Greek Pedagogical College were closed, and the editorial office of the Greek newspaper “Kolekhtivistis” was also liquidated. This, together with the policy of aggressive assimilation, explains why Ukrainian Greeks are one of the most Russified ethnic minorities. Only 6.4% consider Greek (Urumian or Rumian) their native language, while 88.5% – Russian.
Today, the descendants of NKVD executioners rule Russia, and glorify Stalin and other bloody murderers, repeating their terrible crimes. Currently, 80 percent of the territory inhabited by Greeks (Donetsk region) is under Russian occupation. The occupying authorities continue to deport Ukrainians, children and adults, from the occupied territories, the UN Human Rights Mission noted in a report in the summer of 2024.
Russian savages destroyed Mariupol, the capital of the Greek community of Ukraine. Tens of thousands of innocent people killed in mass graves give us only a general idea of the scale of the crime of the Russians and the tragedy of Ukrainians, including Greeks.
Currently, the Russian Federation has extended the period of stay in the occupied territories for Ukrainians without forced receipt of a Russian passport until December 31. So the next wave of deportations and ethnic cleansing may begin in two weeks.
Such systematic behavior of Russian state officials requires large-scale and serious sanctions against the entire country, and not against a few individual personalities.
