Background

Jerzy Broniowski had no memory of his grandmother’s home in what is now Lviv, Ukraine. He was just an infant when she was forced to leave.

At the end of the Second World War, Poland’s eastern border was fixed along the Bug river. Lands to the east, once Polish, became part of the Soviet Union. Over a million people were sent west, forced to abandon their homes.

Poland later agreed to compensate those people who had lost their properties. Most claims were settled immediately after the war.

Jerzy inherited his grandmother’s property claim from his late mother in 1989. By this time, the state had compensated his family with land. However, it later became clear that the land was worth only a fraction of what they were owed. When Jerzy asked for the rest, he was told there was a land shortage.

Other so-called “Bug River” claimants soon began to challenge a series of laws, passed to ease Poland’s transition from communism to democracy, which restricted their ability to receive state property as compensation.

In 2002, Poland’s top court ruled that these restrictions went against the rule of law and the claimants’ property rights.

While the law was changed to allow Bug River claimants to bid for state property, the agencies responsible prevented nearly all auctions from taking place.

Jerzy’s own hopes were shattered when, in December 2003, a new law cancelled Poland’s obligations to those who had already received land in compensation.

There were estimated to be nearly 80,000 Bug River claimants.