Białystok voivodeship

Białystok voivodeship (Polish: Województwo białostockie). Administrative unit in northeastern Poland that existed between 1918 and 1939 and then from 1944 to 1998. Between 1944 and 1975 the Białystok voivodeship had an area of 23,200 sq km and a population of 1.2 million (1974); after the administrative reform of 1975 it had 10,550 sq km and a population of 700,000 (1994). The southeastern part of the province included northern Podlachia (ie, the southern portions of Siemiatycze, Hajnówka, and Bielsk Podlaski counties), which, until the expulsion of the Ukrainian population in 1945–7, was Ukrainian ethnic territory (2,700 sq km; pop 80,000).

[This article was updated in 2013.]