Overview
Ostarbeiter was a Nazi German designation for millions of foreign workers deported from the occupied Soviet Union for slave labor in Germany during World War II. Following Operation Barbarossa, the Germans deported civilians at unprecedented levels from the newly-formed German districts of Reichskommissariat Ukraine, District of Galicia, and Reichskommissariat Ostland. These areas comprised the conquered territories of the Soviet Union within its 1941 borders. The workers included ethnic Ukrainians, Poles, Belarusians, Russians, Armenians, Tatars, and others. The Ostarbeiter program was a war crime and a crime against humanity.