Jukka Rahja

Jukka Rahja (Russian: Иван ( Юкка ) Абрамович Рахья, Ivan Abramovich Rachja; born July 19, 1887 in Kronstadt, † August 31 1920 in Petrograd ) was a Finnish Communist who was active in both the Finnish and the Russian revolutionary movement.

Life

Rahja came from a working class family. His older brother Eino Rahja also was active in the revolutionary movement. Jukka Rahja was metalworkers and joined the RSDLP in 1902. In 1905 he became a member of the Kronstadt Committee of the RSDLP. In the Revolution of 1905 he was one of the leaders of the revolt of the sailors and soldiers. After the failure of the uprising Rahja fled to Finland. Here he continued his political activities in the Finnish Social Democratic Youth League (Finnish Suomen sosialidemokraattinen nuorisoliitto ). Rahja returned back to Russia in 1913 and worked for the party in St Petersburg.

After the October Revolution of 1917 Rahja was deputy commissioner for Finnish affairs. He was one of the organizers of the Finnish Red Guards. Rahja took part in the Finnish Revolution of 1918, and was severely wounded in the fighting at the train station in Kämärä. On August 29, 1918, he was in Moscow at the co-founders of the Communist Party of Finland and was elected to the Central Committee of the Party. He participated as a delegate for the Communist Party of Finland in the founding congress (1919 ) and at the Second Congress (1920 ) of the Comintern.

Rahja was killed with seven other Finnish communists in the attack on the Kuusinen club in Petrograd.

Honors

The urban-type settlement Rachja in the Leningrad Oblast is named after him, since October 1923.