Solomon Lozovskiy

Party official, diplomat, publicist, and Doctor of Historical Sciences. He joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) in 1901. From 1909 to 1917, he lived in France. From 1939 to 1946, he served as Deputy People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs. From 1945 to 1948, he headed the Soviet Information Bureau (Sovinformburo). He was responsible for overseeing the activities of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee (JAC), established in 1942 to raise support for the Soviet Union from ‘Jewish brothers throughout the world’. The JAC’s activities helped facilitate the opening of the Second Front.

He was arrested in January 1949 and accused of Jewish nationalism, creating an anti-Soviet underground organisation, maintaining ties with American intelligence, and committing high treason. The evidence against him was fabricated, and he was subjected to beatings and torture. The trial was held behind closed doors–without public access and without either the prosecution or the defence participating. In July 1952, he was sentenced to death by firing squad with confiscation of his property. He was executed on 12 August 1952. His ashes were buried in Common Grave No. 3 for unclaimed ashes at the New Donskoye Cemetery in Moscow. He was rehabilitated in 1955.

1950s

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The Final Statement

‘I demand either full exoneration or death. I have devoted my entire life to the cause of the Party, and I do not wish to live as a parasite.’

Of my testimony, the court has learned everything about me except nine-tenths of my work in the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions, the Profintern, and the Comintern. I consider it proven that the charges brought against me are supported by no evidence whatsoever.

I am convinced that the Military Collegium will properly assess the forty-two volumes produced by the fifteen defendants and the thirty-five investigators, and will expose this slander in the true spirit of the Party.

Every statement made against me was refuted in court by the very people who had signed those statements during the preliminary investigation.

The only document serving as the principal battering ram of the prosecution is the letter to Molotov and Stalin concerning the settlement of Jews in Crimea. That letter does contain certain nationalist overtones, but since it was never intended for publication, I did not consider it necessary to edit it with particular care.

The expert report concerning the espionage charges is, moreover, highly unusual. The materials selected for this purpose contain no evidence that they were ever sent abroad or identify any individuals responsible for doing so.

Those materials were selected by Ponomaryov and Alexandrov in order to discredit me, and the experts evaluated them in a most superficial manner. On the basis of this report, one is compelled to ask: ‘For what purpose would Lozovsky have done this?’ Only two motives are conceivable–material gain or ideological affinity with American bourgeois circles.

During the investigation, the first motive was immediately dismissed, while the second was never substantiated by any evidence. It seems to me that the Americans would have paid dearly for an agent like me, but they will not live to see such a day–nor will those who are slandering me now.

In support of this, I would point out that foreign <…> and trade unions studied Leninist tactics and programmes of action on the basis of my articles. I could cite many examples of my work in this field. For instance, during the Great Patriotic War, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the United States ‘lost his bearings’ and advanced the theory of the ‘progressive nature of American imperialism’.

Nevertheless, he remained a friend of the Soviet Union, and on Stalin’s instructions I spent eight evenings in conversation with him. Ponomaryov later attempted to exploit this, claiming that Lozovsky had been meeting with a man expelled from the Party.

I have said everything I wished to say, and I ask for no leniency. I demand either full exoneration or death. I have devoted my entire life to the cause of the Party, and I do not wish to live as a parasite. If the court nevertheless finds me guilty of anything, I ask it to petition the Government to commute my sentence to execution by firing squad. But if it should one day become clear that I was innocent, I ask that I be posthumously reinstated in the Party and that notice of my rehabilitation be published in the newspapers.

11 July 1952
Military Collegium of the Supreme Court, Moscow, Soviet Union.
Source: Unjust Trial. The Last Stalinist Execution.
For more information: Wikipedia.
Photo: Wikimedia.