Mr. Speaker, 60 years ago more than 1.7 million Polish soldiers and citizens were arrested and deported simply because they were Polish. The men and women who were taken by the Soviet Secret Police were sent to the far reaches of the Soviet Union to work in forced labour camps or placed in political prisons where many were executed or died of hunger, cold, disease and exhaustion during the second world war.
Tonight at the Polish Combatants Association, the Toronto branch of the Alliance of the Polish Eastern Provinces and its president, Mr. Wladyslaw Dziemianczuk, as well as the Polish Canadian community of Parkdale—High Park, will commemorate this tragic event at a ceremony where a memorial plaque will be unveiled.
Dedicated to all those who made the ultimate sacrifice for freedom, it will serve to remind future generations of the horrors of war and the cost of the freedoms that others are able to enjoy today because of their sacrifice.