rusian SSR of the Soviet Union, and several thousand of the city's Polish inhabitants were deported to remote areas of the Soviet Union. On June 23, 1941 the city came under German occupation that lasted until 16 July 1944. In the course of World War II, the majority of Hrodna's remaining Jews were exterminated in German concentration camps. Being the part of extended East Prussia Hrodna was renamed by Germans to Garten (meaning "garden") in 1942.
Since 1945 the city has been a centre of one of provinces of the Belarusian SSR, now of the independent Republic of Belarus
