Tag #135535 - Interview #78023 (Fridric Iavet)

The change of the population was because of the fact that about 80% of the Jews, Poles, Germans, Romanians there left, and Russians and Ukrainians came instead. In 1940, right before the war, the Germans left - I remember that German officers came to solve the problems of those who were leaving. These officers were invited in Cernauti at the Russian military parade in 1941, two or three weeks before the war started. It was a blitz krieg; nobody expected it, especially because the Germans had a friendship and non- aggression treaty with the Russians. 99% of the Jews were taken to Transnistria. However, in Cernauti many of them stayed behind [escaped] thanks to mayor Popovici, who saved thousands of Jewish citizens. He has a monument in Israel at Yad Vashem. I also have relatives who escaped thanks to him.