Global InformationLeon Narwicz information
Leon Narwicz | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1911 unknown, Ukraine, Russian Empire |
| Died | 1938 Barcelona, Spain |
| Known for | soviet agent |
| Political party | French Communist Party |
Leon Narwicz (Russian: Леон Нарвич, Лев Нарвич), also Leon Narvich,[1] León Druan (1911–1938) was a radical left-wing political militant and revolutionary of mixed Polish, Jewish and Russian background. He was related to the Communist movement in Russia, Poland, Belgium and France. He took part in the Spanish Civil War as member of the International Brigades, serving in French or/and Polish units as a political commissar. He was acting as agent of the Soviet intelligence NKVD and the Republican military counter-intelligence Servicio de Información Militar. His primary task was penetration into and subversion of POUM groups in Catalonia; Narwicz was possibly related to detention of Andreu Nin. He was shot by a Trotskyist hit squad in Barcelona. He is known mostly in relation to internal conflicts within the Republican coalition during the war, and especially in relation to Soviet Communist attempt to dominate other political currents.
- ^ in Spanish and Catalan transcriptions his surname appears – also in official juridical documents related to the trial after his death – in varius spelling versions, compare Agustín Guillamón, El terror estalinista en Barcelona, Valencia 2018, pp. 20, 69-73, 84 and passim. On the cover of the court file, reproduced below, the surname is spelled "Narrvirtsch". Also in western-European historiography and broad public discourse the surname might appear as Narvitch, Narvitsch, Narwitsch, Narwich etc., though the version which prevails is Narvich