Commemoration of Jan Maletka
On November 25, a ceremony in memory of Jan Maletka, who was murdered for helping Jews during the German occupation, was held in Treblinka.
The commemoration of Jan Maletka is part of the “Called by Name” program conducted by the Pilecki Institute. This project, launched by Professor Magdalena Gawin, Secretary of State at the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, aims to wrest from oblivion the history of Poles who paid with their and their relatives’ lives for saving Jews who fell victim to the Holocaust.
The German Nazi extermination camp Treblinka II was one of three (along with Bełżec and Sobibór) centers of mass extermination established to liquidate Jews from the General Government and the Białystok district. It is estimated that during its operation (from July 1942 to November 1943) 800,000–900,000 Jews and Roma were murdered there. Despite the death penalty introduced by the German occupiers for helping Jews, railroad workers tried to help people crammed into freight cars. On August 20, 1942, railroad worker Jan Maletko was shot dead at the Treblinka train station while giving water to Jews trapped in the freight cars.
During the ceremony, the Warsaw Ghetto Museum was represented by Joanna Dudelewicz, Deputy Director for Economic and Organizational Affairs and Investments.
