Apr 24, 2025 | History, Politics, Society
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Poland and Ukraine have issued a joint statement “condemning the act of vandalism” against a memorial in Poland commemorating the burial site of Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) members who died fighting the Soviets during World War Two.
They described the incident as an act of “deliberate provocation that serves, among other things, the interests of the aggressor state – Russia – and is aimed at disrupting the constructive dialogue that has been developing between our countries in recent months”.
Wspólne oświadczenie Ministrów Kultury Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej i Ukrainyhttps://t.co/XnNj9Zzsi9
— PLinUkraine (@PLinUkraine) April 23, 2025
On Tuesday this week, local news website Zlubaczowa.pl reported that unknown perpetrators had removed the plaque that previously stood at the memorial in Monasterz – in southeast Poland near the border with Ukraine – and replaced it with a new one.
The previous plaque had said (in both Polish and Ukrainian): “Mass grave of Ukrainians who died in battle with the Soviet KVD in the Monasterz forests on the night of 2-3 March 1945.” However, the newly installed plaque instead says (only in Polish):
“A mass grave of Ukrainians, members of the UPA responsible for terror and genocide against defenseless Polish, Ukrainian and Jewish populations.
Lord God, have mercy on them and do not hold against them the terrible deeds they committed against their brothers.
‘Forgiveness does not mean forgetting, but healing the pain.’”
Meanwhile, an image of the tryzub – the trident that is a Ukrainian national symbol – present on the memorial was covered by a Christian cross.
The memorial before (left) and after (right) the incident (published with permission of Zlubaczowa.pl)
The memorial, which was first erected in the 1990s, has long been controversial because the UPA, a nationalist Ukrainian partisan formation, was responsible for massacres of Poles and Jews. Parts of the UPA also cooperated with Nazi Germany at certain stages of the war.
The memorial has been vandalised in the past, including when an even earlier plaque – which listed the names of the UPA soldiers who died in the area – was smashed and replaced by the one that was this week removed.
The Ukrainian authorities – including President Volodymyr Zelensky during a 2020 visit to Poland – have long demanded the restoration of the original plaque.
They have also sought to link the issue with Poland’s demands that the remains of victims of UPA-led massacres in Ukraine be exhumed, arguing that for this to happen Poland must also properly protect and respect sites of Ukrainian memory on its territory.
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In response to the latest incident at the memorial, police in the nearby town of Lubaczów told Zlubaczowa.pl that they are investigating what had happened and seeking to identify those responsible.
Subsequently, on Wednesday, the culture ministries of Poland and Ukraine issued a joint statement “strongly condemning the act of vandalism committed against one of the Ukrainian memorial sites in Poland” and declaring that “illegally placed inscriptions and signs must be removed immediately”.
They added that, while the “deliberate provocation serves the interests of Russia” in seeking to “disrupt” Polish-Ukrainian relations, the two countries “reaffirm our strong commitment to further strengthening our strategic partnership and resolving outstanding issues in the spirit of dialogue and mutual understanding”.
Poland says a decision has been made to allow the exhumation in Ukraine of victims of the WW2 Volhynia massacres, in which around 100,000 Poles were killed by Ukrainian nationalists.
The issue has long been a source of tension between the two countrieshttps://t.co/TSd6OoRaaW
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) January 10, 2025
Recent months have seen what Poland describes as a “breakthrough” on the issue of dealing with the historical issues that have long soured relations between two countries that have otherwise been close allies, especially since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine recently granted permission for exhumations of Polish victims of the UPA-led wartime massacres to take place, something Kyiv had banned since 2017 in response to the dismantling of a monument to the UPA in Poland. The first exhumation is due to begin today.
Those atrocities – known as the Volhynia massacres and in which around 100,000 Poles, mostly women and children, were killed – are regarded in Poland as a genocide, though Ukraine has rejected the use of that term.
In another important symbolic moment, in 2023 Zelensky and his Polish counterpart, Andrzej Duda, jointly commemorated the 80th anniversary of the massacres. The speaker of Ukraine’s parliament also “expressed sympathy” towards the victims and their families.
Poland has confirmed details of the first of a planned series of exhumations in Ukraine of the remains of ethnic Poles massacred by Ukrainian nationalists in WWII.
The work will take place at a mass grave in a former Polish village now in western Ukraine https://t.co/dYuX5KOXcv
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) February 6, 2025
Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.
Main image credit: Zlubaczowa.pl
Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.
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Poland and Ukraine jointly condemn vandalism of Ukrainian war memorial in Poland – Notes From Poland
