Byelorussian Central Council
The Belarusian Central Council or the Belarusian Central Rada (Belarusian: Беларуская Цэнтральная Рада, Biełaruskaja Centralnaja Rada; German: Weißruthenischer Zentralrat) was a pro-Nazi semi-government of Belarus in 1943–44. It was a collaborationist structure established by Nazi Germany within the occupational administration of the Reichskommissariat Ostland in the later stages of Operation Barbarossa.
Background
Immediately after the attack on the Soviet positions in eastern Poland, and across Belarussian SSR in 1941, the mass persecution of Jews by the SS forward units of Einsatzgruppe B began, under the command of SS-Gruppenführer Arthur Nebe. Jews were massacred and ghettos were formed in dozens of towns with the participation of Belarusian collaborators who were given various prominent roles. The Belarusian Auxiliary Police was established and deployed to murder operations particularly in February–March 1942.
Following the Germany's rapid conquest, the Generalbezirk Weißruthenien district of RKO was formed which included the Polish towns of Głębokie (Hlybokaye), Wilejka (Vileyka) in Wilno Voivodeship, Nowogródek (Navahrudak), the capital of Nowogródek voivodship around Polesia, as well as at Smolensk in USSR and in all of Soviet Belarus. In 1942, the German civil authority was extended to Minsk, Slutsk and Barysaw. The area was to be made part of the Nazis' project of Lebensraum ("living space"), in which those deemed non-Aryan would be exterminated or expelled to make way for German colonists, while the remaining locals would be subject to forced Germanization.
Central Council of Ukraine
The Central Council of Ukraine (Ukrainian: Українська Центральна Рада, Ukrains’ka Tsentral’na rada) (also called the Tsentralna Rada or the Central Rada) was the All-Ukrainian council that united the political, public, cultural and professional organizations of the Ukrainian People's Republic. After the All-Ukrainian National Congress (19–21 April 1917), the Council became the revolutionary parliament in the interbellum lasting until the Ukrainian-Soviet War.
Overview
From its beginning the council directed the Ukrainian national movement and with its four Universals led the country from autonomy to full sovereignty. During its brief existence from 1917 to 1918, the Central Rada, which was headed by the Ukrainian historian and ethnologist Mykhailo Hrushevsky, evolved into the fundamental governing institution of the Ukrainian People's Republic and set precedents in parliamentary democracy and national independence that formed the basis of an independent Ukrainian identity after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
