Source: International Press Correspondence, Vol. 3 No. 39 [21], 24 May 1923, pp. 467–468.
On-line Publication: Zinoviev Internet Archive, October 2021.
Transcription/Mark-up: Einde O’Callaghan for the Marxists’ Internet Archive.
The Entente murderers have aimed truly. They have robbed our party and the international labor movement of as outstanding personality.
Vazlav Vazlavovitch Vorovsky played his part in the revolutionary movement for more than 30 years. About 1891 he was one of the leaders of the revolutionary circle of Polish students. Already in 1896 he received his first baptism of fire: at the time of the Coronation festivities he was banished from Moscow to the province of Vologda and placed under police surveillance. In the Autumn of 1896 he became an organized member of the Social Democratic circle, which stood in close connection with the “League of Workers” group. In 1897 Comrade Vorovsky was arrested, and there was found upon him a great quantity of manuscripts and illegal literature. In 1898 he was again banished, this time to Viatka, for 3 years.
At this time the literary activity of our dead comrade began. He wrote in the Marxist literary review, under the pseudonym S. Adamovitch, a series of very promising and in part brilliant articles. In 1901 Comrade Vorovsky made has escape from Perm abroad, where he at once occupied a prominent position among the officials of his party who were then in exile. Abroad he resumed his literary work with increased vigor, contributed to the leading party organs and made ready for work in Russia. In 1903, when the split between the Mensheviks and Bolsheviks occurred, Comrade Vorovsky joined the Bolsheviks without the slightest hesitation and occupied an important post in the Bolshevik faction. When the Bolshevik faction published in Geneva its first paper Vperiod (Forward), Comrade Vorovsky, was one of its editors – together with Comrades Lenin, Lunatcharsky and Olminsky. In 1905 Comrade Vorovsky was one of delegates from the Nikolaievsk organization of our party. After the October days of 1905, Comrade Vorovsky, with the rest of the leaders of the Bolshevik Party, returned straightaway to Russia, where he continued his work as one of the members of the “Bolshevik Centre” and as editor of leading Bolshevik papers and periodicals. In 1907 he was, on account of his membership in the party, again prosecuted by the law and banished for 3 years to the province of Viatka. In 1909, at the time of the rabid counter-revolution and its savage persecution, Vazlav Vazlavovitch was a member of the Odessa Committee of the party. In 1910 he was again arrested and brought to trial. In 1912, in the town of Odessa, he played an active part in the election campaign for the IV. Duma, for which he was once more arrested and banished to Vologda.
It is superfluous to mention that, in 1917, Comrade Vorovsky was at his post from the first minute of the existence of the Soviet Power, and took a most active part in all the work of our party.
The splendid articles of Comrade Vorovsky in the old Iskra, which was edited by Plechanov and Comrade Lenin, as well as in the Bolshevik papers Vperiod and Proletarian and in a whole series of legal Bolshevik publications, revealed V.V. Vorovsky to us as one of the most distinguished masters of Marxist literature.
Whoever knew our dead comrade, will never forget his great acumen, his remarkable farsightedness and his Marxist profundity. Comrade Vorovsky was one of these comrades, who have not only stood beside the cradle of the Bolshevik movement, but have also been pioneers and originators of the labor movement generally.
The workers of Russia and of the whole world must know what they have lost in the person of Comrade Vorovsky.
The murder was committed in the land of the most Advanced “democracy”. Comrade Vorovsky came to Switzerland to participate, as the representative of Soviet Russia, in the Conference which was to solve the Turkish question. The arrival of the Soviet representative was a thorn in the side of all those, who wanted, without unnecessary noise, to complete the strangulation of the Turkish people behind closed doors. For some days the papers quite openly wrote, that the nationalist cut-throats were planning an attack upon our envoy. The “great”, respectable newspapers conducted only the usual “diplomatic” campaign against our representative, but in reality they have prepared the ground for the Fascist murder.
The responsibility for the bloody deed lies not only with the leader of Swiss Fascism and the handful of petty bourgeois who stand at the head of the celebrated “democratic” Swiss republic. The political responsibility for this unheard of crime is to be borne, before all, by the Entente Governments, the so-called “inviting” Powers who are the stage managers and masters of the Lausanne Conference.
The shooting of Comrade Vorovsky occurred at a time of excitement. The “Die Hard” section of the English imperialists are moving heaven and earth in order to plunge Europe into the abyss of a new war. All these are links in one chain: the Ruhr, the triumphal journey of General Foch, the ultimatum of Curzon, to Soviet Russia, the murder of Comrade Vorovsky and the incredibly insolent attitude of the Polish bourgeoisie, the growth of international Fascism, the furious onslaught of Capital.
One of the founders of our party, one of the best representatives of international Marxism, one of the most unselfish functionaries in the international labor movement, has fallen at his post.
Let us close our ranks! The time is coming when the murder of Comrade Vorovsky and the instigators of this murder must be made answerable to the working class.
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Last updated on 3 May 2023