In his address on April 10, Polish President Andrzej Duda stated: “For 80 years the victims and their families have never seen justice meted out for the Katyn crime. Genocide has no statute of limitations. Therefore, I will demand that this case be settled before international courts. We will submit appropriate motions in the near future. This crime must be finally judged, and perpetrators named.”

He pointed out that the murder of nearly 22,000 Polish countrymen on the orders of Joseph Stalin in 1940 “was a crime of genocide committed by the Soviets on completely defenseless victims”. The president added that the crime had never been punished.

Andrzej Duda expressed the conviction that “forgotten and unpunished war crimes and crimes against humanity build a sense of impunity for the perpetrators. This in turn is approval for their successors and followers. We can see it fully today in the course of Russia’s brutal aggression against an independent and democratic Ukraine”, added the president.

The Polish leader announced that he would take all possible diplomatic steps so that the world would not forget about the Katyn massacre and would consistently condemn its perpetrators. “We owe it to those who died, but we also owe it to those who fought for the truth and memory of Katyn over the years”, said Andrzej Duda.

Adrian Andrzejewski