SLOVAK-POLISH RELATIONSHIPS IN 1938-1947 IN THE CONTEXT OF BORDER DISPUTES

After World War I Poland demanded a connection to the northern part of the former Kingdom of Hungary (Spis, Orava and Kysuce). This area was also claimed by Czechoslovakia. The regions became the subject of the Czechoslovak-Polish territorial dispute. The Supremę Council decided by plebiscite on the regions of Tesin, Orava and Spis on 28 September 1919. In the end it was not a plebiscite which decided about the controversial territory, but international arbitration. The Conference of Ambassadors decided on dividing Spis and Orava between Poland and Czechoslovakia on 28 July 1920. Most of the inhabitants disagreed with the decision. Another border dispute occurred in 193 8 after the signing of the Munich Agreement, when Poland madę a claim not only to other parts of Orava and Spis but also Kysuce. The Slovak-Polish Delimitation Committee was attacked by inhabitants of disputed territory several times, resulting in the Polish army occupying the area. After the beginning of the Second World War all parts of the regions of Spis, Orava and Kysuce became part of Slovakia, as Bratislava collaborated with Berlin. At the end of WWII the border was returned to the pre-Munich position but the situation in the disputed territory was unstable for a long time after 1945.