Trial of the Sixteen

[2][3][4][5] The Polish politicians were presented with a warrant of safety, but were instead arrested in Pruszków and brutally beaten by the NKVD on 27 and 28 March.

The date was chosen carefully to be at the same time as a conference on the creation of the Soviet-backed Polish puppet government was organized.

General Okulicki's witnesses for the defense were declared unreachable "owing to bad atmospheric conditions", and no evidence was offered during the trial.

[16] Of the sixteen defendants, twelve were sentenced to prison terms ranging from four months to ten years, while charges against the four others were dropped by the prosecution.

[16] Immediately after the arrest of all the leaders, the Polish government in exile sent a protest note to Washington and London demanding their release.

The show trial of 16 leaders of the Polish wartime underground movement (including the Home Army and civil authorities) convicted of "drawing up plans for military action against the U.S.S.R.", Moscow, June 1945. All of them had been invited to help organize the new "Polish Government of National Unity" in March 1945 and were subsequently captured by the NKVD .