Poland marks World War II-era massacre by Ukrainian nationalists | Russia-Ukraine war News

Polish leaders marked the anniversary of the killing of Polish people during World War II and called for truth and strengthened ties with Ukraine.

Poland’s leaders have marked the anniversary of a World War II-era Ukrainian massacre of Poles by stressing that only the full truth about the violence that Poland describes as a genocide can strengthen bilateral ties with its neighbour in the future.

Polish President Andrzej Duda and Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Monday – during an observance of the Day of Memory of the Victims of Genocide – that the anniversary was the best time to condemn the murder of Polish civilians by Ukrainians during and just after World War II and to build proper graves for the victims.

“Let this truth in fact serve as a foundation … for new relations between our nations and societies,” Duda said.

Poland is among the staunchest allies of Ukraine in its defence against Russian aggression and is providing political support, weapons, and routes for Ukraine’s exports, especially grain. Millions of Ukrainian refugees have also found shelter in Poland since Russia’s invasion in February.

The violence that occurred between 1942 and 1945 remains a point of contention, however.

 

For decades, under Moscow’s control, the incident was a taboo topic and it still remains hard to discuss between the neighbours.

Historians say that more than 100,000 Poles, including women and even the smallest children, perished at the hands of their Ukrainian neighbours in a nationalist drive in areas that were then in southeastern Poland and are mostly in Ukraine now.

July 11, 1943, marked the peak of the violence, known as “Bloody Sunday,” when the fighters of the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists carried out coordinated attacks on Poles praying in or leaving churches in more than 100 villages, chiefly in the Volhynia region.

Poland established the day of memory in 2016 and insists that the events constituted a genocide – a word that both Duda and Morawiecki used in their speeches on Monday.

Ukraine, however, describes the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists as independence fighters. Ukraine’s identity as a sovereign state was also built around this organisation.

The two Polish leaders also said that allowing this historical wound to continue festering would only divide the neighbours at a trying time and that would ultimately serve Moscow’s purposes.