ABSTRACT
The Curzon Line is the eastern boundary of Poland with Lithuania, Belarus and Ukraine. Following the Russian Civil War, the repulse of the first Polish invasion of Russia and the subsequent Soviet invasion of Poland, the alignment of the boundary was proposed by the Western powers at the Spa Diplomatic Conference in July 1920. The Curzon Line, together with the Oder-Neisse Line, thus became two of the key boundaries in post-World War II Europe. The Curzon Line was subsequently declared inviolable by the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, signed in Helsinki on 1 August 1975. In the immediate post-World War II period, the Soviet Union was able to use a continuation of the Curzon Line southwards to remove part of Slovakia, thereby giving itself access through Ukraine to both Czechoslovakia and Hungary. This proved highly significant during the Cold War period.
