The city council in Gdansk, Poland is to conduct a ceremony in honour of Irishman Sean Lester at its headquarters in the city next Thursday.

Lester, who was born in Carrickfergus, Co Antrim and who joined the Irish Department of External Affairs in 1923, became high commissioner of the League of Nations in Gdansk (then Danzig) in 1934. In that capacity he struggled valiantly to frustrate the designs of the local Nazis to have Danzig (which enjoyed free city status), incorporated in the German Reich. He also protested repeatedly against the German government’s persecution of the Jews.

Lester went on to become secretary-general of the League of Nations and was the last person to hold this office before the organisation was superseded by the United Nations in 1946.

The ceremony in Gdansk next week, in which a meeting room will be named after Lester, will be attended by the Irish Ambassador to Poland, Declan O’Donovan, and by Sean Lester’s daughter, Ann Gorski.

Sean Lester is the subject of a number of studies, the most recent of which is Sean Lester, Poland and the Nazi Takeover of Danzig, by Paul McNamara. He has also been the subject of a film documentary directed by Neal Boyle.