Vera Kharuzhaya

Vera Kharuzhaya (Вера Харужая, Wiera Charuża, September 27, 1903 - November 1942) was a Belarusian Communist writer and activist.

Vera Kharuzhaya was born in Babruysk into the family of an administrative worker. In 1919 she graduated from a workers school in Mazyr and began to work as a teacher in public schools.

Since 1920 Kharuzhaya has actively participated in anti-Polish partisan movement, being a Political commissar of local Komsomol branches in the areas of Mazyr and Babruysk in Eastern Belarus.

In 1922-1923 she worked in the administration of the Central Committee of the Komsomol of Belarus, also working in several Belarusian Soviet newspapers.

After graduating from the senior communist party school, in February 1924 she was sent to West Belarus, then part of the Second Polish Republic, where she was appointed member of the Central Committee of the Komsomol of West Belarus and printed several illegal Belarusian communist newspapers.

In September 1925 Kharuzhaya was arrested and sentenced 8 years of prison. In 1932 she was handed over to the USSR in exchange for a political prisoner held in a Soviet prison.

In 1935 Kharuzhaya was excluded from the Communist party following her husband reporting her to the authorities. In 1937 she was arrested by the NKVD and spent two years in prison. In August 1939 Kharuzhaya was released.

After the German attack on the USSR Kharuzhaya joined a partisan unit. In November 1942 she was arrested and eventually executed by the Germans.

In 1960 Kharuzhaya was posthumously granted the title Hero of the Soviet Union, on that occasion one of the streets in the centre of Minsk has been renamed by the Soviets in honour of Kharuzhaya.