“I will not rest until we find the last grave, the last burial place of Poles murdered in Volhynia and the entire Eastern Borderlands”, said Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki during the celebrations of the National Day of Remembrance for the Victims of Genocide committed by Ukrainian nationalists against citizens of the Second Republic of Poland. The commemoration in Warsaw’s Volhynia Square was held with the participation of the President of Poland, the Prime Minister and the families of the victims.

During the ceremony, Polish President Andrzej Duda said that “what is happening today between Poles and Ukrainians is the best proof that it is not about revenge. There are no Poles today who do not know what the Volhynian slaughter was, and yet they take Ukrainians under their roof, and bring help to the whole nation and state,” emphasised the president.

In the years 1943-1945, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) carried out an action of cleansing Volhynia and the Eastern Borderlands from the Polish minority. As the Chancellery of the Prime Minister emphasises, it was “driven by nationalist inclinations” and was merciless even towards children and women. Historians estimate that nearly one hundred thousand Poles were brutally murdered.

Prime Minister Morawiecki pointed out that reconciliation is key in the current situation for both countries.

“There will be no reconciliation based on falsehood, on forgetting, on lies. This must be the starting point and this is the starting point for reconciliation”, stated the Prime Minister.

President Duda said that Poland expects the truth. “We want to be able to pray on the graves of our closest family members, compatriots indicated by name if it is still possible”, Andrzej Duda added. “We want to offer the same so that where Ukrainians are buried on our land, there will also be a grave. And there will not be as many as in Volhynia. But let’s not focus on numbers. I would prefer that we focus on how much truth we can show, including the truth that is shameful to us, and how much truth our neighbours can show. Let our new relationship between our nations and societies be built on this truth”, appealed the Polish President.

Adrian Andrzejewski