The Polish foreign ministry is demanding that the destruction of a monument to the Poles murdered in 1944 in the village of Huta Pieniacka in Ukraine should be examined by authorities.

The ministry asked for the perpetrators to be identified and held to account.

Ukrainian police in the Lviv region said on Thursday the monument had been destroyed by an explosive charge.

On 10 January, the Polish Embassy in Kyiv addressed a note in which it emphasised that such attacks and incidents must be investigated and punished, because they put Polish-Ukrainian relations at risk.

The Polish Consulate in Lviv is in contact with local authorities, which informed the Polish counterparts that a task force was immediately established to conduct a probe.

Local authorities informed the Polish Consulate that they view the incident as directed against both Poles and Ukrainians, and suggested that a joint ceremony be held at Huta Pieniacka on 27-28 February to pay tribute to the victims of the crime and mark its 73rd anniversary.

Located near the town of Brody in the Lviv region, Huta Pieniacka, a village that no longer exists today, is the site where Ukrainian soldiers of the SS Galizien Division, 4th SS Police Regiment, murdered several hundred Polish citizens on 28 February 1944.

The Union of Poles in Ukraine (ZPnU) condemned the destruction of the monument in Huta Pieniacka and demanded that those responsible should be punished, but added that it is unlikely that the perpetrators will turn out to be Ukrainian nationals.

A statement published on the ZPnU website said: “We, the Union of Poles in Ukraine, doubt the involvement of Ukrainians in the destruction of the monument in Huta Pieniacka. None of the groups existing in Ukraine identify with the Nazi ‘SS’ symbols which were painted on the monument”.

(rg)

Source: MSZ