Vatslav Vorovsky

Vatslav Vatslavovich Vorovsky (; 27 October [ O.S. 15 October] 1871 – 10 May 1923) was a Russian Bolshevik revolutionary, literary critic, journalist, and Soviet diplomat. One of the first Soviet diplomats, Vorovsky is best remembered as the victim of a May 1923 political assassination in Switzerland, where he was the official representative of the Soviet government to the Conference of Lausanne.

Biography

Early years Vatslav Vorovsky was born on 27 October 1871 (n.s.) in Moscow, the son of an ethnically Polish but Russified noble and engineer. His father died when he was a year old, and he was raised by his mother. Following the completion of secondary school. In 1890, Vorovsky enrolled at the University of Moscow, where he was exposed to the ideas of political radicalism. He was arrested by the Tsarist secret police in 1897, held for two years in Taganka Prison, then exiled in 1899 to the city of Orlov. to help launch the first exclusively Bolshevik publication, Vperyod (Forward), of which he was an editor. In 1917, after the February Revolution in Russia, Vorovsky was appointed to three-man Bolshevik Stockholm Bureau, along with Karl Radek and Yakov Hanecki.

Vorovsky was the first director of Gosizdat, the State Publishing House, from its foundation in 1919 until 1921.

Diplomatic career Following the victory of the Bolshevik Revolution in November 1917, Vorovsky was named the Soviet government's diplomatic representative to Scandinavia, remaining based in Stockholm.

In December 1918, Sweden, responding to pressure on the part of the Allied powers who were intent upon imposing an unbreakable blockade, withdrew official recognition of Vorovsky as the representative of Soviet Russia. This action on the part of the Swedish government forced Vorovsky's return to Russia the following month. This action taken against Vorovsky followed the actions taken by Great Britain in expelling Maxim Litvinov in September 1918 and that of Germany in expelling Adolph Joffe in November of that same year.

In March 1919, Vorovsky served as a member of the Soviet delegation to the Founding Congress of the Communist International. Grigorii Zinoviev was tapped as president of the organization. This success proved short-lived, however, as negotiations to extend the six-month treaty failed in May 1922.

On May 9, Vorovsky dispatched his final report to Moscow, noting that three days earlier a group of right wing youths had appeared at his hotel and sought a meeting. Vorovsky wrote:

"I refused to receive them, and Comrade Ahrens, who went out to them to find out what it was all about, disposed of them at once, telling them that they should put such matters before their Government. Now they are going about the town declaring that they will compel us to leave Switzerland by force, and so on.

"As to whether the police are taking any measures for our safety, we have no idea. At any rate, it is not apparent on the surface. It is only too evident that behind these hooligan boys there is some conscious directing hand — possibly foreign. The Swiss Government, well aware of what is going on — for the papers are full of it — must bear responsibility for our safety. The behaviour of the Swiss Government is a shameful violation of the guarantees given at the beginning of the conference, and any attack on us in this particularly well-organised country is only possible with the knowledge and permission of the authorities. On them is the responsibility."

On the evening of 10 May 1923, Vorovsky was seated at a dining table in the restaurant of his hotel with his colleagues when the group was approached by an individual they did not know. The unknown figure, a Russian White émigré named Maurice Conradi, pulled a gun and shot Vorovsky to death, wounding his two companions, Ahrens and Divilkovsky, in the attack.

A poem by Vladimir Mayakovsky, titled Vorovsky, was dedicated to him in honor of his death.

The Palaces of Culture in the city of Konakovo, Tver region and in the city of Ramenskoye, Moscow region were named after Vatslav Vorovsky.

In 1990, the Russian Coast Guard launched a Menzhinskiy-class (project 11351 - NATO Krivak III Class) ship named for Vorovskiy (Воровский 160).

Works Советъ против партии (The Council Against the Party). Geneva: Bonch-Bruevich and Lenin Publishing House of Social-Democratic Party Literature, November 1904. —Reissued by Partizdat, 1933. Литературно-критические статьи (Literary-Critical Articles). Moscow: Gospolitizdat, 1948.