An international scientific session devoted to the Katyn massacre of thousands of Polish army officers held as POWs by the Soviet NKVD during World War Two has been organized in Warsaw.

The meeting is accompanied by an exhibition of drawings made by one of the Polish prisoners of the camp in Starobielsk. Following the session its participants will place a symbolic urn at the Katyn Monument  in the capital with earth gathered from the sites of the camps in Kuropaty and Bykovnia. On Sunday, special mass is to be celebrated at the Holy Cross basilica in memory of those murdered in Katyn, Charkov, Tver, Bykovnia and Kuropaty.

The session and accompanying events have been organized on the 66th anniversary of the Soviet communist authorities breaking of diplomatic relations with the erstwhile Polish government in exile residing in London over the discovery of the true perpetrators of the massacre in Katyn. Earlier, the Soviets attempted to put the blame on the Nazis when that part of land, on present day Ukrainian territory, had been under German occupation. For long post-war decades Russia denied the findings and refused to take responsibility for the genocide.

SS