Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced that “a decision has been made on the first exhumations of Polish victims” of the UPA. “I would like to thank the ministers of culture of Poland and Ukraine for good cooperation. We are waiting for further decisions,” he added. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha, in turn, stated that any agreement in relations between Ukraine and Poland is a “blow” to Russia.
“Finally a breakthrough. There is a decision on the first exhumations of Polish victims of the UPA. I thank the ministers of culture of Poland and Ukraine for good cooperation. We are waiting for further decisions,” wrote the head of government on the X platform.
On Thursday, the Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of National Unity Ukraine Oleksiy Chernyshov visited Poland and met with the Minister of Culture and National Heritage, Hanna Wróblewska. “The ministers discussed the key role of culture in maintaining national identity, as well as the impact of culture on the socio-economic development of both countries,” the Ministry of Culture said.
Ukrainian minister on “a blow to Moscow”
“We respect each other and together we face Russian imperialism. Any agreement in AU-PL (Ukrainian-Polish) relations is a blow to Moscow,” said the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Andriy Sybiha, in connection with the information provided by Donald Tusk. Sybiha thanked the members of the working group coordinated by the ministers of culture of both countries, Hanna Wróblewska and Mykola Toczycki, for reaching the agreement. “We believe in continuing to implement agreements with mutual respect,” the minister wrote on Platform X.
A long-standing dispute over exhumation
At the end of November, Ukraine confirmed that there are no obstacles to conduct search and exhumation work on its territory.
Poland and Ukraine have been divided for many years by the memory of the role of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, which in 1943-45 committed genocidal ethnic cleansing of approximately 100,000 Polish men, women and children.
Ukrainians want to perceive the OUN and UPA only as anti-Soviet organizations (due to their post-war resistance to the USSR), and not anti-Polish organizations.
Ostrówki, Ukraine, 28/07/2011. Archaeologists work in a mass grave on the so-called dead field Darek Delmanowicz/PAP
Main photo source: Darek Delmanowicz/PAP