[1] Born in 1887 to Slovak parents in Nagybiccse (today Bytča), then part of Hungary, Austria-Hungary, Tiso studied several languages during his school career, including Hebrew and German.

An anti-fascist partisan insurgency was waged, culminating in the Slovak National Uprising in summer 1944, which was suppressed by German military authorities, with many of its leaders executed.

When the Soviet Red Army overran the last parts of western Slovakia in April 1945, Tiso fled to Austria and then Germany, where American troops arrested him and then had him extradited back to the restored Czechoslovakia, where he was convicted of high treason, betrayal of the national uprising and collaboration with the Nazis, and then executed by hanging in 1947 and buried in Bratislava.

Jozef Tiso was born in Bytča (then Hungarian: Nagybiccse) to Slovak Latin Catholic parents, in Trencsén County, of the Kingdom of Hungary, part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

Interestingly that his writings rather reveals that his identity was stronger linked to the entire monarchy of Austria-Hungary, than to the Kingdom of Hungary, whose citizen he formally was.

[8] On 8 December 1918, the Hungarian National Council in Nitra delegated him to negotiate with the Czechoslovak Army which was invited to "restore and maintain public order".

While the party still operated within a democratic framework, Tiso's colleague and political rival Vojtech Tuka formed two internal movements to oppose the state or its regime – the first collaborating with Hungarian irredentism and the second led by pro-fascist Rodobrana.

He spent the 1930s competing for Hlinka's mantle with party radicals, most notably the rightist Karol Sidor – Tuka was in prison for much of this period for treason.

In 1938, with increasing pressure from Nazi Germany and Hungary, the representatives of HSĽS questioned neighboring states on their views for the future of Slovakia.

Therefore, well aware of the weak economic position of Slovakia, the lack of qualified people and an unstable international situation, he felt he was stuck with Czechoslovakia for the time being.

[21] He, however, continued negotiations with the central government in Prague, explained the goals of potential autonomy and refused a military solution of the Czechoslovak-German crisis.

In a radio speech to the citizens, Tiso did not mention Ribbentrop's promise, but blamed the Prague government and its "policies of the past twenty years".

[25] The Slovak government guarantees all citizens adequate assistance and protection.The day before the award, police arrested several Jews at a demonstration of the Hungarian Youth Organization calling for the cession of Komárno to Hungary.

Their participation was then used in propaganda blaming the Jews for the result (Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy obviously did not carry out "the wish of the Jewry" but followed their own interests).

He held direct meetings with the German representative Arthur Seyss-Inquart, in which Tiso initially expressed doubts as to whether an independent Slovakia would be a viable entity.

On the initiative of the President of the assembly, Martin Sokol (himself previously a strong proponent of the Czecho-Slovak state with guaranteed autonomy for Slovakia), endorsed a declaration of independence.

[34] On 15 March, Germany occupied the remaining rump of Czechoslovakia after Hitler coerced a sick Czech President Emil Hácha into acquiescing.

Tiso not only supported Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland in September 1939 but contributed Slovak troops, which the Germans rewarded by allowing Slovakia to annex 300 square miles of Polish territory.

[39][40] The "Salzburg Summit" resulted in closer collaboration with Germany, and in Tuka and other political leaders increasing their powers at the expense of Tiso's original concept of a Catholic corporate state.

The agreement called for dual command by the Slovak People's Party and the Hlinka Guard (HSĽS), and also an acceleration in Slovakia's anti-Jewish policies.

"[47] Later in 1942, amid Vatican protests as news of the fate of the deportees filtered back, and the German advance into the Soviet Union was halted, Slovakia then became the first of Hitler's puppet states to shut down the deportations.

[48] Mazower wrote: "When the Vatican protested, the government responded with defiance: 'There is no foreign intervention which would stop us on the road to the liberation of Slovakia from Jewry', insisted President Tiso".

[49] Distressing scenes at railway yards of deportees being beaten by Hlinka guards had brought protests, including from leading churchmen such as Bishop Pavol Jantausch.

[44][dubious – discuss] According to Mazower, "Church pressure and public anger resulted in perhaps 20,000 Jews being granted exemptions, effectively bringing the deportations there to an end".

[52] Tiso remained in office during the German army's occupation, but his presidency was relegated to a mostly titular role as Slovakia lost whatever de facto independence it had.

Burzio begged Tiso directly to at least spare Catholics of Jewish ancestry from deportation and delivered an admonition from the Pope: "the injustice wrought by his government is harmful to the prestige of his country and enemies will exploit it to discredit clergy and the Church the world over".

[54] On 15 April 1947, the Czechoslovak National Court (Národný súd) found him guilty of many of the allegations against him, and sentenced him to death for "state treason, betrayal of the antifascist partisan insurrection and collaboration with Nazism".

Decades later, after a DNA test in April 2008 that confirmed it, the body of Tiso was exhumed and buried in St Emmeram's Cathedral in Nitra, in accordance with canon law.

James Mace Ward writes in Tiso's biography Priest, Politician, Collaborator (2013): "At its worst, [the debate] was fuel for an ultranationalist attempt to reconstruct Slovak society, helping to destabilize Czechoslovakia.

Ultranationalist propaganda proclaims Tiso as a "martyr" who "sacrificed his life for his belief and nation", and so tries to paint him as an innocent victim of communism and a saint.