Franz Koritschoner (23 February 1892 – 9 June 1941) was an

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

politician. Born in

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

, Koritschoner was a leading figure of the

Communist Party of Austria The Communist Party of Austria (, KPÖ) is a communist party in Austria. Established in 1918 as the Communist Party of Republic of German-Austria, German-Austria (KPDÖ), it is one of the world's oldest Communist party, communist parties. The KP� ...

(KPÖ), and a member of its Central Committee until 1928. He translated the works of Lenin and edited the central party organ ''

Die Rote Fahne ''Die Rote Fahne'' (, ''The Red Flag'') was a German newspaper originally founded in 1876 by Socialist Worker's Party leader Wilhelm Hasselmann, and which has been since published on and off, at times underground, by German Socialists and Commun ...

''. Koritschoner was one of the organizers of the

1918 Austro-Hungarian January Strike The Austro-Hungarian strike of January 1918 was a strike which spread across Austria-Hungary between January 3 and 25, 1918 demanding better living and working conditions and an end to World War I. It is known as the "Jännerstreik" as opposed to t ...

, and was arrested after its resolution. He joined the Austrian Communist Party shortly after its foundation in 1918. In 1926, he went to Russia in order to work with the

Profintern The Red International of Labor Unions (, RILU), commonly known as the Profintern (), was an international body established by the Communist International (Comintern) with the aim of coordinating communist activities within trade unions. Formally ...

, and became a close associate of its leader

Solomon Lozovsky Solomon Abramovich Lozovsky (, family birth name: Dridzo , 1878–1952) was a prominent Communist and Bolshevik revolutionary, a high-ranking official in the Soviet government, including as a Presidium member of the All-Union Central Council of Tr ...

. In 1930, he joined the

Communist Party of the Soviet Union The Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU),. Abbreviated in Russian as КПСС, ''KPSS''. at some points known as the Russian Communist Party (RCP), All-Union Communist Party and Bolshevik Party, and sometimes referred to as the Soviet ...

. In the wake of the

Stalinist purges The Great Purge, or the Great Terror (), also known as the Year of '37 () and the Yezhovshchina ( , ), was a political purge in the Soviet Union that took place from 1936 to 1938. After the assassination of Sergei Kirov by Leonid Nikolae ...

, he was arrested in 1937. In 1940, by decision of the Soviet Supreme Court, he was

extradite In an extradition, one jurisdiction delivers a person accused or convicted of committing a crime in another jurisdiction, into the custody of the other's law enforcement. It is a cooperative law enforcement procedure between the two jurisdict ...

d to

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...

. On June 7, 1941, he was deported to

Auschwitz Auschwitz, or Oświęcim, was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It consisted of Auschw ...

, where he was murdered two days later. After

Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and the Premier of the Soviet Union, Chai ...

's "

Secret Speech "On the Cult of Personality and Its Consequences" () was a report by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, made to the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union on 25 Februa ...

" in 1956, Koritschoner was politically rehabilitated.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Koritschoner, Franz 1892 births 1942 deaths Austrian communists Communist Party of Austria politicians Executive Committee of the Communist International Politicians who died in Nazi concentration camps Austrian people who died in Auschwitz concentration camp Communist Party of the Soviet Union members

See also

References