__NOTOC__ The Main Administration for Affairs of Prisoners of War and Internees ( rus, Главное управление по делам военнопленных и интернированных НКВД/МВД СССР, ГУПВИ, GUPVI, GUPVI NKVD SSSR/ MVD SSSR) was an

NKVD The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (russian: Наро́дный комиссариа́т вну́тренних дел, Naródnyy komissariát vnútrennikh del, ), abbreviated NKVD ( ), was the interior ministry of the Soviet Union. ...

(later MVD) department in charge of handling of foreign civilian internees and

prisoners of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold prisoners of w ...

(POWs) in the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

during and in the aftermath of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

(1939–1953). GUPVI was established as a part of the NKVD under the name "Administration for Affairs of Prisoners of War and Internees (UPVI) in September 1939, after the

Soviet invasion of Poland The Soviet invasion of Poland was a military operation by the Soviet Union without a formal declaration of war. On 17 September 1939, the Soviet Union invaded Poland from the east, 16 days after Nazi Germany invaded Poland from the west. Subs ...

. The qualifier "main" was added in January 1945. The legal foundation for its creation was the Sovnarkom Decree of July 1, 1941 "Regulations on Prisoners of War" ("Положение о военнопленных"), updated by the September 29, 1945 "Regulations on Use of Labor of Prisoners of War" (Положение о трудовом использовании военнопленных). In many ways, the GUPVI system was similar to

GULAG The Gulag, an acronym for , , "chief administration of the camps". The original name given to the system of camps controlled by the State Political Directorate, GPU was the Main Administration of Corrective Labor Camps (, )., name=, group= ...

. Karner, Stefan, ''Im Archipel GUPVI. Kriegsgefangenschaft und Internierung in der Sowjetunion 1941-1956.'' Wien-München 1995.
book review
English) *Russian translation: 2002, Its major function was the organization of foreign forced labor in the Soviet Union. Top GUPVI leadership came from the GULAG system. Conditions in the two camp systems were similar: hard labor, poor nutrition and living conditions, high

mortality rates Mortality rate, or death rate, is a measure of the number of deaths (in general, or due to a specific cause) in a particular population, scaled to the size of that population, per unit of time. Mortality rate is typically expressed in units of de ...

."Internment: A Form of Soviet Repression of Poles and Polish Citizens"
One major difference with the GULAG system was the absence of convicted criminals in GUPVI camps. Another was that GUPVI camps provided a major source of recruitment of future

communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, ...

activists for

communist state A communist state, also known as a Marxist–Leninist state, is a one-party state that is administered and governed by a communist party guided by Marxism–Leninism. Marxism–Leninism was the state ideology of the Soviet Union, the Comint ...

s such as the

German Democratic Republic German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **G ...

and the

Polish People's Republic The Polish People's Republic ( pl, Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa, PRL) was a country in Central Europe that existed from 1947 to 1989 as the predecessor of the modern Republic of Poland. With a population of approximately 37.9 million ne ...

, as well as for various "democratic committees" made up of nationals such as Japanese and Austrians."GUPVI Archipelago"
an article in '' Arguments and Facts'', no. 49, December 2004Japanese POV in Krasnoyarsk Krai
by M. Spiridonov Significant efforts were made to "ideologically reforge" (''идеологическая перековка'') prisoners, and numerous clubs, libraries and local radio stations were created. During the GUPVI's fourteen-year existence, it administered over 500 POW camps in the Soviet Union and abroad, housing over four million prisoners.

Chiefs

*1939-1943: Pyotr Soprunenko,

major of state security Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...

*1943-1945:

I.A. Petrov IA, Ia, or ia may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Ia'', an 1892 novelette by Arthur Quiller-Couch * "Iä", a fictional word in the works of H. P. Lovecraft * International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE), which also goes by ...

lieutenant general Lieutenant general (Lt Gen, LTG and similar) is a three-star military rank (NATO code OF-8) used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages, where the title of lieutenant general was held by the second-in-command on th ...

*1945-1947: Mikhail Krivenko (Krivenko Mikhail Spiridonovich, 1904–1954) *1947-1949:

Taras Filippov Taras may refer to: Geography * Taras (ancient city) of Magna Graecia, modern-day Taranto * Taras, Iran, a village in Tehran province * Taras, Łódź Voivodeship, Poland * Taraš, a village in Vojvodina, Serbia * Taras, Kazakhstan, a villag ...

, lieutenant general *1949-1950: I.A. Petrov, lieutenant general (deputy chief, until his discharge for health reasons on November 21, 1950) *1950-1953:

Amayak Kobulov Amayak Zakharovich Kobulov (russian: Амаяк Захарович Кобулов; 1906–1955) was a Soviet politician and member of the Soviet security (OGPU- NKVD) and police apparatus during and briefly after the Joseph Stalin years, as was ...

, lieutenant general (1950-1951: NKVD GUPVI, 1951-1953: MVD UPVI)

Notes

References

Bibliography

*Sharkov, Anatoli, ''GUPVI Archipelago: Prisoners of War and Internees on the Territory of Belarus: 1944--1951''(in Russian) (2003), Minsk, Belarus,
Online excerpt
*

Maksim Zagorulko Maxim (also Maksim, “Maxym”, or Maksym) is a male first name of Roman origin. It is common in Slavic-speaking countries, mainly in Belarus, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Montenegro, Russia, Serbia, and Ukraine. The name is derived from the Latin fam ...

(ed.) (2005) "Regional Structures of the USSR NKVD/MVD GUPVI, 1941-1951: Reporting and Informational Documents" (Regionalnye Struktury GUPVI NKVD-MVD SSSR, 1941-1951 : Otchetno-Informatsionnye Dokumenty; Региональные структуры ГУПВИ НКВД - МВД СССР. 1941 - 1951: Военнопленные в СССР. 1939 - 1956: Документы и материалы. Отчетно-информационные документы. Т. 5: Кн. 2) {{in lang, ru NKVD Military history of the Soviet Union during World War II World War II prisoners of war held by the Soviet Union Unfree labor during World War II Unfree labor in the Soviet Union

Chiefs

See also

Notes

References

Bibliography