Vanda Skuratovich was a Belarus

Belarus

Belarus , officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered clockwise by Russia to the northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Its capital is Minsk; other major cities include Brest, Grodno , Gomel ,...

ian Roman Catholic activist

Activism

Activism consists of intentional efforts to bring about social, political, economic, or environmental change. Activism can take a wide range of forms from writing letters to newspapers or politicians, political campaigning, economic activism such as boycotts or preferentially patronizing...

 and one of the Belarusians to have been declared by the State of Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

 to be Righteous Among the Nations

Righteous Among the Nations

Righteous among the Nations of the world's nations"), also translated as Righteous Gentiles is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis....

.

During the Second World War

Occupation of Belarus by Nazi Germany

The occupation of Belarus by Nazi Germany occurred as part of the German invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941 and ended in August 1944 with the Soviet Operation Bagration.- Background :...

 she served as a partisan in Piotr Masherau's unit. She reportedly rescued a Jewish family from being deported to a concentration camp..

After the war, Skuratovich was a staunch activist, organizing religious ceremonies, largely forbidden by Soviet authorities at that time, at her home. She actively participated in the campaign by Belarusian Roman Catholics demanding return of the Kalvaryja Church

Kalvaryja

Kalvaryja is a Catholic Calvary cemetery in Minsk, Belarus.The cemetery contains a small Catholic chapel, currently used for general worship. The original wooden Catholic church was first built here back in 1673, but currently the oldest remaining graves are from 1808. The small chapel was built...

 in Minsk, which was returned to the Catholic Church in 1980.

Vanda Skuratovich died in Minsk

Minsk

- Ecological situation :The ecological situation is monitored by Republican Center of Radioactive and Environmental Control .During 2003–2008 the overall weight of contaminants increased from 186,000 to 247,400 tons. The change of gas as industrial fuel to mazut for financial reasons has worsened...

on 12 January 2010, aged 84.