Warsaw and Kiev will not achieve full reconciliation until the remains of Poles killed by Ukrainian nationalists in World War II are found and buried, the Polish prime minister said today at a ceremony marking the anniversary of the Volyn massacre, Reuters reported, quoted by BTA.
After Russia began its invasion of Ukraine, Poland became one of Ukraine’s staunchest allies, but relations between the two neighboring countries have been strained for decades because of the mass killings in Volhynia (a historical region in northwestern Ukraine) between 1943 and 1945.
“This crime is so specific that it should be called by its true name… It was genocide,” Mateusz Morawiecki said at the memorial ceremony in Warsaw. “Poland and Ukraine will not achieve full reconciliation until all mortal remains are found and finally honored,” he added.
Poland says Ukrainian nationalists killed more than 100,000 Poles in World War II. Then thousands of Ukrainians also died, adds Reuters.
The area where the mass killings took place was populated by both Poles and Ukrainians, and before it was occupied by the USSR, it fell within the borders of Poland.
In 2013, the Polish parliament recognized the massacre carried out by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army as “ethnic cleansing bearing the marks of genocide”.
Kiev does not accept this position and treats what happened in Volhynia as a conflict between Ukraine and Poland, affecting both sides.
Warsaw is demanding that Ukraine admit Polish specialists and give them unrestricted access to the places where the mortal remains of the dead Poles are, so that they can be exhumed and buried with dignity.
In 2017, Ukraine banned Poland from such activities on its territory. In 2022, however, Kiev gave permission to Polish representatives to search for remains in a Ukrainian village.
On Sunday, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and his Polish counterpart Andrzej Duda attended a Catholic service in memory of the victims, which took place in the Ukrainian city of Lutsk.
2023-07-11 15:55:28
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