PIOTR MALEJKO

1. Rank, name and surname of the interviewee:

Sergeant Piotr Malejko.

2. The expulsion of the civilian population. Its course and conditions:

I was arrested for crossing the demarcation line near Przemyśl.

3. Methods of interrogating and torturing the arrestee during investigation:

During the investigation in Przemyśl and Lwów, they used force upon me and many other inmates in the form of beating and threatening.

4. Court procedures, ruling in absentia, ways of delivering verdicts (particularly desirable are full texts of judgements):

For crossing the demarcation line I was sentenced in absentia to three years of labor camp. After the sentence had been read out, I was isolated from the others together with a couple of inmates.

5. Cases of people who were murdered during their march, during their deportations, during their stay in prison or during their work as forced laborers:

After arriving on barges in the town of Usa [Ust-Usa] on the Pechora river, during a march from Usa to Abis the ones who couldn’t keep up were beaten. It was in such circumstances that the riflemen of the ochrana finished off Cudzymowski, from near Rzeszów. During work in settlement 2, section 4 of the Pechora labor camps, those resisting or unable to work were tortured in many ways (stripped naked in the cold, tied to trees, starved).

While staying in hospital 2 of section [otdielienija] four, I accidentally overheard a conversation between prison doctors, one of whom mentioned a number of 250 thousand prisoners deceased in the Pechora camps, referring to the statistics kept in the camp administration.

7. Life in the forced labor camps (camp organization and work quotas): During our stay in the settlements we lived in damp, dirty mud huts plagued with bedbugs and lice. Hygienic conditions were horrible due to the lack of water. Quotas were unattainable. Food rations were extremely poor. Those who didn’t fill the quotas were beaten, starved, and forced to work extra hours. Through the course of three months, 70% of the laborers were gone.

8. Life in prisons:

I stayed in prison for eight months. The cells were overcrowded, infested with bedbugs and lice. Food was poor, insufficient. Constant harassment of the inmates by searches and interrogations, most often at night. Incredibly hostile attitude on the part of the NKVD authorities.

Office stamp, 16 March 1943.