Yuri Zhukov, senior scholar at the History Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, claims that documents proving Stalin’s security service (NKVD) murdered over 20,000 Polish officers in the Katyn massacres are “counterfeit”.

Zhukov has told the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper that the Soviet’s original claim the Nazis were responsible for the murders was probably correct.

He says that only a few things are for certain, however.

“People, mostly Poles, were shot in Katyn. But the exact date of the shootings, the number of deaths and their nationality, should be established by an independent judicial inquiry."

The historian believes that the documents (pictured right) proving Stalin and the NKVD’s guilt in the murder of Polish officers were forgeries. In Zhukov’s view, disclosure of the graves by Joseph Goebbels was part of a German Nazi propaganda offensive following defeat  at Stalingrad.

Counter-revolutionaries

Zhukov is taking issue with documents made public last April which show that on 5 March, 1940, the Soviet politburo decided to kill several thousands of Polish prisoners, who they claimed were, “nationalists and counter-revolutionaries”.

On their release, President Medvedev said of the documents, signed by Stalin: “'Let people see it, let them know who made the decision to kill the Polish officers. It's all there in the documents. All signatures are there, all the faces are known.”

But Zhukov, the revisionist 73 year-old historian, disagrees. He told the same pro-Kremlin newspaper two years ago that “Russian citizens who deliberately distort historical facts must face criminal charges.”

On being asked by Komsomolskaya Pravda about the Katyn massacre, he said: “This issue will be resolved when the Poles answer for the extermination of our prisoners captured in 1920 [during the Polish-Soviet war].” (pg)