Minister Rau’s first visit to Iran
09.05.2022
On 7-9 May 2022, invited by the Iranian side, Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau paid an official visit to the Islamic Republic of Iran during which he met with the Republic’s President Ebrahim Raisi, President of the Islamic Consultative Assembly Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, and held political consultations with Iran’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Hossein Amir-Abdollahian.
The official talks of heads of diplomacies of Poland and Iran provided an opportunity to discuss key issues in bilateral cooperation and share views on current regional and global problems, in particular Russia’s ongoing aggression against Ukraine. The head of the Polish MFA presented Poland’s position, as the current OSCE chair, on the security situation in Eastern Europe. During the visit, the Polish and Iranian foreign ministers signed an Agreement between the Government of the Republic of Poland and the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran on cooperation in the fields of culture, education, science, sports, youth and mass media.
The Polish top diplomat’s first visit to Iran took place on the 80th anniversary of evacuation of General Anders’ army from the USSR to Iran, which started on 18 March 1942. By November 1942, more than 115,000 people including around 78,500 soldiers and 37,000 civilians, almost 18,000 of them children, were evacuated. Polish refugees received a warm and generous welcome from the Iranian nation. At the end of 1942 and the beginning of 1943, Polish camps were located at Tehran, Isfahan, Mashhad, and Ahvaz. First schools were set up in Tehran and after a year there were ten of them. The Polish orphanage in Isfahan, nicknamed “the city of Polish children”, hosted 2,300 children and 300 adults as well as eight primary schools.
Ahvaz’s Camp Polonia was one of main departure centres for Poles leaving Iran, and it was finally closed in 1945. Around 90 per cent of evacuees were ethnic Poles, with the remaining ten per cent of other national minorities of the Second Polish Republic. Most of the refugees eventually left Iran after a few months and were transported to many distant countries such as Lebanon, Palestine, India, Uganda, Kenya, Tanganyika, Southern and Northern Rhodesia, South Africa, New Zealand, and Mexico.
As part of the anniversary celebrations, Minister Rau visited Polish places of remembrance, including cemeteries where the soldiers of Anders’ Army and civilians had been buried. In Tehran and Isfahan, Minister Rau officially opened an exhibition by the Polish Institute of National Remembrance titled “Trails of Hope. The Odyssey of Freedom” showcasing the situation of Polish troops and refugees in the Middle East.
Łukasz Jasina
MFA Spokesperson
Photo: Sebastian Indra/MFA