Belarusians in Latvia: Sketches by Kastusionak

I have no time for thorough, comprehensive and systematic work to clarify the position of the Belarusian national minority in Latvia. But I feel a great need for suitable information about our life here, so I am offering the Belarusian public a series of short sketches on various questions. Sometimes they will resemble a chronicler's note, and sometimes they will grow into a full article.

I shall be very glad if I provoke an exchange of views and questions. I will gladly answer personal letters too.

I.

Soviet Belarus and Latvia.

The news of the expansion of the territory of Soviet Belarus and the annexation to it of the Vitebsk and Mahilioŭ regions greatly pleased all sincere supporters of the Belarusian national revival. In this fact Latvian public figures saw a new manifestation and proof of the awakening of national consciousness among the Belarusian people, even in that part of it which, from their point of view, had been hopelessly russified by the Muscovites.

They regard the creation of a Belarusian State of 4 million people, with an area of 100,000 square versts, as a fact marking the final victory, in the Belarusian movement, of the idea of state independence.

But alongside this sincere joy of the most far-sighted politicians, alarm appeared among certain chauvinistic, short-sighted politicasters:

"How will Soviet Belarus treat Latvia?"

"Will it not want to tear Latgalia away from Latvia, where a fairly considerable number of Belarusians live?"

"How do the local Belarusian elements view the expansion of Soviet Belarus?"

"Have they not developed ideas hostile to the state?"

This part of the Latvian public began to look closely at individual Belarusian activists and to listen to the talk of the Belarusian peasantry in the border part of Latgalia.

Up to the last moment the Belarusians in Latvia carried on only cultural and educational work.

Politics and economic work were left aside, because there were not enough conscious workers even to fill all the vacant teaching posts in the Belarusian secondary schools, for which workers had to be brought in from outside Latvia.

The absence of Belarusian political work, and of political groupings and parties within the Belarusian national minority, has meant that not a single Belarusian cultural and educational figure has a definite political face in the eyes of Latvian politicians.

For this reason, guesses, inquiries, reports and clarifications began about each of the Belarusian activists in Latvia.

The old enemies of the Belarusian national minority in Latvia (from Russian and Polish circles) used the moment for "friendly hints."

People building their careers in various "security" and "detective" institutions, with an energy worthy of their profession, rushed onto the new "trail," looking for any occasion to "uncover," "find," "prove" something.

Well, naturally, a "boom" was bound to arise around the Belarusians in Latvia.

And it did.

For about a month now the Belarusians have had the honor of learning every day, from the Latvian and Russian press, all sorts of interesting fables about themselves.

The most "zealous" Latvian officials are diligently searching for "Belarusian sedition."

All the born "informers" and "reporters" are writing denunciations with zeal.

The okhranka is at work.

II.

Maps of Belarus.

Citizen Ozolin, inspector of primary schools of the Dvinsk county, "found" in the Belarusian primary school at Dudeli in the Uzvalda volost an ethnographic and physical "Map of Belarus," published in Vilnia in 1919 and already hanging for two years in that school.

On the map the Inspector saw that the ethnographic boundary of Belarus was drawn in such a way that it takes in Dvinsk and Liucyn.

The Inspector boiled over.

He took the map off the wall at once.

He wrote a report to the Ministry of Education and sent the seditious map there as well.

The Ministry passed the matter to the Prosecutor.

An investigation is under way.

The ill-fated map has already been banned for use in schools.

The most nervous newspapers are already drawing conclusions about activity hostile to the state from the story of this map.

It must be stressed that the map was published in 1919, that is, at a time when the state borders of Latvia had not yet been defined in final form. Therefore on the map, which marked the ethnographic boundaries separately and the state boundaries separately, the eastern state border of Latvia was not marked at all, and only the border of Latvia with Estonia and Lithuania was drawn.

When the map was sent out to the schools by the Belarusian Department in 1922, the state border of Latvia in the east was marked on it too, in accordance with the peace treaty of 1920.

The most interesting thing is that this border agrees neither with the pre-war scholarly data nor with the Latvian census taken in 1920.

III.

The Geography of Belarus.

Arkadz Smolich wrote a Geography of Belarus.

"Let teachers and schools," he wrote, "make use of this first attempt at a Belarusian geography."

Some curious Latvian professor examined the "Geography of Belarus" and gave this opinion:

"A. Smolich's geography has drawn excessively broad boundaries for the Belarusian people. For the Latvian state it is altogether harmful."

The Geography was banned from use in the Belarusian schools of Latvia.

And now the children are taught geography without a geography textbook.

The Belarusian Department intends to publish a new geography, but when that will be is unknown.