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WOLHYNIAN MASSACRES (1943
– 1945) From the website of Polish Institute of National Remembrance |
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What were the Volhynian Massacres?
The Volhynian massacres were anti-Polish genocidal ethnic
cleansings conducted by Ukrainian nationalists. The massacres took place
within Poland’s borders as of the outbreak of WWII, and not only in Volhynia, but also in other areas with a mixed
Polish-Ukrainian population, especially the Lvov, Tarnopol,
and Stanisławów voivodeships
(that is, in Eastern Galicia), as well as in some voivodeships
bordering on Volhynia (the western part of the
Lublin Voivodeship and the northern part of the Polesie Voivodeship – see map).
The time frame of these massacres was 1943−1945. The perpetrators were
the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists−Bandera faction (OUN-B) and
its military wing, called the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). Their documents
show that the planned extermination of the Polish population was called an
“anti-Polish operation.” Ukrainians
in Interwar Poland, 1918-1939 Having been annexed by its neighbors in the late 18th century,
the Polish state, as reconstituted directly after WWI, had approx. 5 million
Ukrainian inhabitants. This was roughly 16% of the population. In some
south-eastern regions (Volhynia, Eastern Galicia)
Ukrainians constituted the majority. Most Ukrainians from Volhynia
and to the west in the Lublin Voivodeship were
Orthodox Christians. The majority of Ukrainians in Galicia, however, were Uniates, or Greek Catholics (i.e., Christians preserving
the Eastern rite, but recognizing the authority of the Pope), whose ethnic identity was much stronger. Over 90 % of
Ukrainians in the Second Republic of Poland lived in the countryside, 3−6%
worked in industry, and ca. 1% were intellectuals. According to the 1931
census, the population of the Volhynia Voivodeship was slightly over 2 million. Ukrainians
constituted a vast majority of the local population — approx. 64% (ca. 1.5
million), followed by Poles — 15.6 % (ca. 340,000), Jews — 10 % (ca.
210,000), Germans — 2.3 % (ca. 47,000), Czechs — 1.1 % (ca. 30,000), and
other less numerous minorities.
Pre-war Poland was rife with Polish-Ukrainian disputes.
Following the overthrow of the Tsar in Russia, both the White Movement and
the Bolsheviks made it impossible for Ukrainians to establish their own state
with a capital in Kiev. The creation of the Western Ukrainian People’s
Republic was hampered by the Ukrainian defeat in the Polish−Ukrainian
War and the loss of Lvov (1918). Most Galician Ukrainians did not accept the
political status quo. On the other hand, the Polish authorities
did not deliver on their own promises. For instance, they failed to open
Ukrainian university (as per the 1922 Act of Parliament) and they imposed
restrictions on Ukrainian elementary and secondary education. Radical
Ukrainian organizations began to use terrorism as a form of political
pressure. The Polish politician Tadeusz Hołówko and the minister of the interior Bronisław Pieracki were
assassinated in 1931 and 1934 respectively. These were the two most infamous
assassinations conducted by the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN),
founded in 1929. The OUN also used terror against pragmatic Ukrainian
activists. In reaction to the act of sabotage conducted by the OUN in the
fall of 1930, the Polish authorities ordered pacification of Eastern Galicia.
This operation consisted of arrests, beatings, the compulsory quartering of
Polish troops in Ukrainian villages, and in the so-called vicious searches
(combined with destruction of property and crops). Even though the Ukrainian
National Democratic Alliance (UNDO) did reach an agreement with the Polish
government in the summer of 1935 and won its own political representation in
the Polish parliament, the Polish concessions (e.g., credits for Ukrainian
entrepreneurs, partial amnesty, and the release of some OUN activists from
the camp for political prisoners in Bereza Kartuska) were insufficient for the Ukrainians. Even the
“Volhynian experiment” – that is, fairly liberal
administration of the Volhynia Voivodeship
under governor Henryk Józewski
during 1930−1938 – did not change the situation. When taking office Józewski declared that “a way for the Polish and
Ukrainian nations to coexist peacefully had to be found.” Nonetheless, his concessions, were also to prove insufficient. Moreover, in
the late 1930s Polish authorities tightened policy towards Ukrainians, which
led to Polonisation in Volhynia,
especially in the Chełm region, combined with
destruction of Orthodox churches. September 1939 and the Soviet
Occupation The course of events sped up after the outbreak of World War II
in September 1939. 110,000 of the one million soldiers of the Polish Army
were Ukrainian. They fought arm-in-arm with the other soldiers of the Polish
Army. At the same time, however, a Ukrainian nationalist terror flared up in Volhynia, particularly after the Soviet invasion of
Poland on September 17, 1939. Instances of rape, looting, and murder spread
across Volhynia. Polish manors and farms were set
ablaze. The number of Polish victims is estimated at 2,000−3,000. Many
of those people were soldiers, policemen, clerks, and refugees who had
evacuated from Central Poland as it was being overrun by Hitler’s invasion
force. Moreover, the Germans began to play the Ukrainian card. The “Sushko” legion is a good example. Six hundred men strong,
this OUN detachment was trained by the Abwehr and
organized by the Germany-based Col. Roman Sushko.
The Sushko legion took part in the German invasion
of Poland from the south.
The Polish territories that found themselves under the Soviet
occupation stretched eastward from the Pisa, Narew, Bug, and San rivers and
constituted 52 % of Poland’s territory (ca. 200,000 km˛). Inhabited by over
13.7 million people, they were incorporated into the USSR. The period of the Soviet occupation of Poland’s eastern
territories was one of numerous repressions, mostly (but not solely) against
Poles. The persecutions continued with varying intensity and in various forms
until the German invasion of the USSR on June 22, 1941. By then hundreds of
thousands of Polish citizens had been arrested, imprisoned, or deported to
Siberia during four deportation campaigns. Various repressions were levelled
against Polish political and social activists, reserve officers, priests,
landowners, policemen, foresters, industrialists, merchants, military and
civilian settlers and their families, along with escapees from the
territories occupied by Germany. But in mid-1940 the Soviets intensified the
repressions against Ukrainian nationalists.
Deportations
of 1939-1944 (click on the map for better resolution and legend) After the German invasion of the USSR, the NKVD massacred almost
all the people detained in Volhynian and Galician
prisons before its evacuation from those territories. The number of victims
in Łuck alone is estimated at 2,000−4,500.
Similarly, approx. 500 people were killed in Dubno.
Moreover, before their retreat from Lvov the Soviets murdered over 3,000
Polish, Ukrainian, and Jewish prisoners. The German Occupation, and
the Holocaust Many Ukrainians hoped that the Third Reich would help create a
Ukrainian state. In the summer of 1941 Ukrainian inhabitants of many
localities enthusiastically welcomed the arriving German detachments.
Ukrainians erected arches to welcome the Germans and they put up Ukrainian
flags. On 30 June OUN-B set up Jaroslaw Stećko government in Lvov. Germans, however, were
not interested in this political offer and sent the OUN-B leaders (including
Bandera) to concentration camps. In the summer of 1941 Germans initiated a
series of pogroms of Jews in Volhynia and Eastern
Galicia, which the Ukrainian militia formed by Banderites,
took part in. For instance, during the Petlura Days
(July 25-27) approx. 1,500 people were killed in Lvov. The former Volhynian Voivodeship and parts
of the Lvov and Polesie voivodeships
were incorporated as Generalbezirk Wolhynien und Podolien into Reichskommissariat Ukraine with its capital in Równe. Not only German, but also Ukrainian administrative
bodies were established in those territories. The latter were to ensure
delivery of provisions for Germans, recruit laborers to the Third Reich, and
construct and repair roads. Lvov became part of the General Government as the
capital of District Galicia (Distrikt Galizien).
The occupier waged terror throughout Volhynia,
which some Ukrainians greeted with dismay. The Ukrainian nationalists from
the OUN, however, chose to support the occupier. The Germans conscripted
approx. 5,000 volunteers into the newly-created Ukrainian auxiliary police.
At the very beginning of the occupation the Germans executed several hundred
representatives of the Polish and Jewish intelligentsia on the basis of lists
drafted by the OUN. These massacres took place in Krzemieniec,
Kostopol, and Równe.
Moreover, the Germans carried out arrests, executed inmates in prisons, and
conducted public executions. After they had captured Lvov, the Germans
inspired a pogrom against the local Jews and murdered 25 Polish professors at
Wuleckie Hills in Lvov. Thousands of Poles were
detained in concentration camps.
Ukrainian
policemen from various units Soon, the Ukrainian police in German service and Einsatzkommandos began to organize mass
executions of Volhynian Jews. The Jews from the
ghettos were not transported to death camps, but killed on the spot, that is,
in ditches outside cities or at the edge of forests. By October 1942 the
Germans had killed approx. 247,000 Volhynian Jews
(97 % of all local Jews). The executions of Jews in Eastern Galicia began in the fall of
1941. Most victims were intellectuals or “unproductive elements” (that is,
people incapable of work). Deportations to death camps (mostly Bełżec and Sobibór)
began in the spring of 1942. The Ukrainian police also participated in the
Holocaust in Galicia. The brutal extermination of Jews proved that people
could be killed on an unprecedented scale, with impunity, and in keeping with
binding German law. The Genocide on Poles
Conducted by the OUN-B and UPA Following the mass deportations and arrests carried out by the
NKVD and after the subsequent German repressions (e.g., deportation to the
Reich to forced labor, arrests, detention in camps, and mass executions), by
1943 Poles constituted only 10−12 % of the entire population of Volhynia. Poles became an ethnic group deprived of most
of its social activists, intellectuals, and military men. Thus, the Poles did
not seek to create conflict situations. On the contrary, they did everything
to avoid them. This fact should be stressed because some Ukrainian historians
try to dispute it. Contrary to the truth, they suggest that the Volhynian massacres were not the first, but the second
stage of a bloody Polish-Ukrainian conflict. According to their version,
which has no basis in reality, the first stage began in the spring of 1943 as
a “peasant war” (a “Jacquerie”) — spontaneously,
and not inspired or controlled by Bandera’s OUN. The war was purportedly
declared by the “masses of Ukrainian refugees” from the Chełm
region who had fled across the Bug River eastward as
early as 1942/1943. In Volhynia they inflamed the
anti-Polish sentiments among Ukrainian peasants by telling them about the
atrocities Poles had purportedly committed against Ukrainians in the Chełm region. All this is in line with the
pro-Bandera propaganda put forward during the last stages of World War II and
successfully promoted after the war by émigré Ukrainian nationalist
historians associated with OUN-B. The first particularly cruel massacre of Poles took place on
February 9, 1943 in the colony of Parośla
located 1 km from Sarny. The number of Polish
victims exceeded 155. In early 1943 the Ukrainian auxiliary police in Volhynia and Podole had nearly
12 thousand members. In March and April approx. 5 thousand of them deserted
from the German service taking weapons and ammunition. Many of them had
previously participated in murdering Jews of Volhynia.
Majority of the deserters joined UPA, and many of them became commanders.
From that moment on the number of initially sporadic massacres of Poles
increased. The OUN-UPA terror assumed a mass scale in the summer and fall
of 1943. The massacres of Poles initiated in the Sarny,
Kostopol, Równe, and Zdołbuny counties spread across to Dubno and Łuck counties in
June 1943. In July of that year they affected the Kowel,
Włodzimierz Wołyński,
and Horochów counties, before spreading further
still to Luboml county in August. The month of July
1943 proved particularly tragic, with the Sunday of July 11, 1943 being
especially bloody. At the crack of dawn that day UPA detachments (often
actively supported by local Ukrainians) simultaneously surrounded and attacked
99 Polish villages in the Kowel, Włodzimierz Wołyński,
and Horochów counties, as well as in a part of Łuck county. Ukrainians ruthlessly slaughtered
Polish civilians and destroyed their homes. Villages were burned to the
ground and property was looted. Researchers estimate that on that day alone
the number of Polish victims may have amounted to some 8,000 people — mostly
women, children, and the elderly. The perpetrators used bullets, axes,
pitchforks, knives, and other weapons. Many Poles were killed in churches. Attacks on churches were indeed common, as the Bandera followers
wanted to murder as many Poles as possible. On “Bloody Sunday” of July 11,
the Ukrainians killed approx. 200 parishioners in the church in Poryck. The local parish priest, Father Bolesław Szabłowski,
a Pole, was killed a bit later. Similarly, the Polish priest Father Jan Kotwicki died along with some 150 parishioners in the
church in Chrynów. Father Józef
Aleksandrowicz, aged 74, was killed in similar
circumstances in the Zabłoćce parish.
Furthermore, Polish parishioners died in the churches in Krymno
and Kisielin (approx. 40 and 80 victims
respectively). Poles had to abandon their homes and seek shelter in the cities
and towns which had posts of Hungarian and German troops. It was an irony
that in order to escape from the UPA Poles had to seek protection from their
oppressors: firstly from the Germans, and during 1944−1945 from the
Soviets. The Germans deported Polish escapees to the Reich to forced labor.
To escape the massacres some escapees tried to get to the General Government,
particularly to the Lublin District. Finally, a small number of Poles created
self-defence centers to protect themselves, with the most well-known ones
located in Przebraże (where 10,000 Poles
defended themselves), Huta Stepańska
(600 Poles dead), Zasmyki, Dederkały,
and Ostróg. Due to the lack of arms, ammunition,
and a cadre of commanders most of the approx. 100 Polish self-defence centers
were defeated. The tragic events of 1943 in Volhynia
had a significant influence on the development of the Polish underground,
including the formation of the largest partisan unit of the occupation
period, that is, the 27th Volhynian
Infantry Division of the Home Army. Formed within the framework of Operation
Tempest (January−February 1944), the division had up to 7,000 soldiers.
Initially (that is, until mid-March 1944) the division fought against the UPA
to protect the surviving Polish population as well as against the German
Army. Thereafter, it joined the Red Army in frontline combat against German
and Hungarian troops. Moreover, several thousand Poles (mostly in Polesie Wołyńskie)
fought in the ranks of Soviet partisan units, where Poles sought help and
protection from the UPA for their families. For these same reasons, in the
summer of 1944 at least several thousand Poles joined the “destruction
battalions” — Soviet auxiliary military police
subordinate to the NKVD. It remains uncertain as to what extent those
destruction battalions formed in early 1945 protected Poles against the UPA
and to what extent they provoked the UPA to carry on with its campaigns. The Effects of the Volhynian
Massacres In 1944 the anti-Polish terror of the OUN-UPA shifted to Eastern
Galicia (the Lvov, Stanisławów, and Tarnopol voivodeships) as well
as to the Lublin region. Polish researchers cautiously estimate the number of
Polish victims of the Volhynian massacres, which
started during the winter of 1942/43 and ended in mid-1945, at approx.
100,000 (40,000–60,000 victims in Volhynia, 30,000−40,000
in Eastern Galicia, and at least 4,000 in today’s Polish territory, including
up to 2,000 in the Chełm region— as was called the south-eastern part of the Lublin Voivodeship was called). Moreover, the Ukrainian partisan
units forced at least 485,000 Poles (125,000 from Volhynia,
300,000 from the Eastern Galicia, and 60,000 from the Chełm
region) to flee to central Poland to avoid death. It should also be said that
in the spring of 1944 nearly 20,000 Ukrainians from the Chełm
region abandoned their homes for fear of the Polish underground. The number of Ukrainian victims of Polish retaliatory attacks
until the spring of 1945 is estimated at 10,000−12,000 (approx. 2,000−3,000
in Volhynia, 1,000−2,000 in Eastern Galicia,
and, until 1947, 7,000−8,000 on present-day Polish territory, including
2,500 in the Chełm region). Some Polish
retaliatory attacks were war crimes. According to Polish historians, however,
those attacks cannot be equated with the organized anti-Polish operation of
the OUN-UPA. The Roman Catholic Church lost approx. 200 members of the clergy
(priests, monks, and nuns) on the Eastern Borderlands during 1939−1947.
It is also estimated that Ukrainian nationalists killed 28 Greek Catholic
clergymen and approx. 20 Orthodox clergymen in Volhynia. The Łuck diocese in the Volhynian Voivodeship lost 50
Catholic churches (i.e., 31 % of all temples). Another 25 chapels (15 %) were
burned down, vandalized, or destroyed. As a result of the UPA raids ca. 70%
of all 166 parishes ceased to exist. All rural parishes (churches, chapels,
and rectories) were destroyed. It is estimated that 1,500 of the 2,500 Volhynian
localities inhabited by Poles in 1939 ceased to exist due to the operations
of the OUN-UPA (they were burned down or otherwise destroyed). Today in only
150 localities are there crosses commemorating the tragic death of the more
than 10-thousand Polish victims of the massacres (monuments are less frequent
still, and some are not even on the burial site). Thus, in ca. 1,350 Volhynian localities there are still no crosses on the
graves of Polish victims of the OUN-UPA.
The Ukrainian Righteous
According to a range
of testimonies, many Ukrainians helped their Polish neighbors whose lives
were in danger. That help assumed the following forms: warnings about
attacks; showing an escape route during an attack; sheltering Poles before an
expected attack; misleading the attackers; the provision of first aid to
wounded Poles; the provision of food or clothing to survivors; taking care of
orphans and children lost after attacks; helping to bury the victims; refusal
to carry out an order to kill a Polish member of one’s own family; refusal to
participate in an attack; public protest; sparing the lives of Poles; and the
release of arrested Poles. Even though it is difficult to estimate the
scale of this help, it was real. In 500 localities of the Eastern Borderlands
examined in this regard (massacres occurred in over 4,000 localities) the
OUN-UPA killed ca. 20,000 Poles. Ukrainian acts of solidarity and mercy saved
both individuals and populations of entire villages (several thousand people
in total). Over 1,300 Ukrainians are documented as having helped Poles to a
lesser or greater extent. Ukrainian nationalists killed several hundred of
the righteous as punishment, for all manifestations of friendliness toward
Poles were regarded as acts of collaboration with the enemy and betrayal of
national ideals, and that called for merciless revenge. THE
BOOK OF THE RIGHTEOUS OF THE EASTERN BORDERLANDS 1939 - 1945 (pdf, 3.75 MB) THE
BOOK OF THE RIGHTEOUS OF THE EASTERN BORDERLANDS 1939 - 1945 (epub, 915.66 KB) THE
BOOK OF THE RIGHTEOUS OF THE EASTERN BORDERLANDS 1939 - 1945 (mobi, 800.28 KB) Chronology
1941/1942 —
Ukrainians in Volhynia begin to form military
detachments, partly for protection against the pacifications conducted by
German units with the use of Ukrainian police. Birth of the Ukrainian
Insurgent Army (Ukrayins’ka Povstans’ka Armiya, UPA)
led by the prewar Petlura-supporter Taras Bulba-Borovets. Spring/summer
1943 — Taras Bulba-Borovets is
attacked for his refusal to submit to the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists-Bandera
faction (Orhanizatsiya Ukrayins'kykh Natsionalistiv,
OUN-B) and to participate in the ongoing anti-Polish ethnic cleansings. Late
1942 — the conference of miltary officials
of Bandera’s OUN in Lvov results in a decision to form partisan detachments
that are to initiate a nationwide uprising at the most opportune moment.
Moreover, all Poles and Jews are to be expelled from Ukrainian territory
under threat of death. Those who refuse to leave voluntarily are to be
killed. 1942/1943 —
Bandera’s OUN forms partisan detachments in Volhynia.
They begin to use a name that was to become widely known in Volhynia — the UPA. February
9, 1943 — a UPA detachment under the command of Hryhorij Perehijniak “Dovbesho-Korobko” massacres the Polish village of Parośle, killing over 150 people. March/April
1943 — about 5,000 Ukrainian policemen, ones who have
participated in the extermination of Jews, desert from the German service and
join the pro-Bandera partisan units. March
and April 1943 — the greatest intensification of the UPA’s massacres,
committed mostly in Sarny, Kostopol,
and Krzemieniec counties. March
1943 — UPA detachments under the command of Ivan Lytvynchuk
“Dubovy” massacre a minimum of 179 people in Lipniki. The
night of April 22−23, 1943 — a UPA detachment
personally commanded by “Dubovy” burns down the
village of Janowa Dolina,
murdering ca. 600 Poles. May−June
1943 — the UPA broadens the scope of its “anti-Polish
operation” to include Dubno, Łuck,
and Zdołbuny counties. June
1943 — Dmytro Klyachkivsky
“Klym-Samur” gives the order to exterminate the
Polish population of Volhynia. July−August
1943 — the UPA operation spreads over the entirety of Volhynia. July
11−12, 1943 — the climax of the first phase of the Ukrainian terror
against Poles in Volhynia. On July 11 and July 12
the UPA attacks 99 and 50 Polish villages respectively (e.g., Poryck, Sądowa, Zagaje, and Kisielin). July−August
1943 — the biggest wave of the UPA attacks on Polish localities
(in July alone the number of Polish victims exceeds 10,000). August
28−31, 1943 — the UPA attacks 85 localities (e.g., Ostrówki
and Wola Ostrowiecka)
mostly in Kowel, Włodzimierz
Wołyński, and Luboml
counties. July−August
1943 — the greatest intensification of the UPA attacks on the Polish
self-defense centers (e.g., Huta Stepańska was defeated on July 18, 1943, while Przebraż near Łuck
managed to fight off the attack on August 30, 1943). 1943/44 —
another wave of UPA raids on Polish localities in Równe,
Łuck, Kowel, and Włodzimierz Wołyński
counties. Mid-January
1944 — the beginning of the concentration of Polish detachments
(ca. 6,500 soldiers) and the subsequent formation of the 27th Volhynian Infantry Division of the Home Army [27 Wołyńska Dywizja Piechoty Armii Krajowej], which fought against the Germans and
Ukrainians. In July 1944 the division was forced to fight its way westward to
the Lublin region. Mid-1943 —
individual acts of murdering Poles in Eastern Galicia. End
of 1943 — the central leadership of Bandera’s OUN and the Eastern
Galician UPA led by Roman Shukhevych “Taras Chuprynka” decide to de-Polonize
these territories. Ukrainians distribute leaflets calling on all Poles to
leave Eastern Galicia under threat of death, and then carry out their
threats. February
1944 — the final wave of the UPA attacks on Poles in Volhynia (e.g., on the cloister in Wiśniowiec). 1943/1944 —
the first UPA attacks on Poles in Eastern Galicia (e.g., in Kruhów and Markowa). February
1944 — intensification of the UPA attacks on Polish
settlements, particularly in the Stanisławów
and Tarnopol voivodeships
(e.g., in Korościatyn, Hanaczów,
and Berezowica). February
28, 1944 — massacre of the village of Huta
Pieniacka (ca. 600 victims) conducted by the 4th SS
Police Regiment consisting of volunteers to the “Galizien”
SS Division. March
11, 1944 — a UPA detachment (probably supported by volunteers from
the “Galizien” SS Division) massacres Poles in the
Dominican cloister in Podkamień. March
1944 — the wave of violence moves to the Lvov Voivodeship (e.g., Huta Wierchobuzka, Wołoczków,
and Wasylów). April
1944 — the UPA attacks on Poles spread across the entire
Eastern Galicia. In April 1944 the number of victims numbers some 8,000. The
night of April 9−10, 1944 — the UPA conducts
massacres along the line stretching from Hanaczów
in the north to villages in the Stanisławów Voivodeship in the south (e.g., 300 farms are set ablaze
and 40 Poles are killed in Tomaszowce; Pniaki, Sokołów, and Zady are burned down). April
12, 1944 — the UPA massacres ca. 100 Poles in Huciska. May-August
1944 — the UPA continues its attacks on Poles (e.g., 120
victims in Bryńce Zagórne,
and an attack on Polish passengers of a train in Zatyl). End
of July 1944 — Polish administrational structures and a garrison of the
Home Army begin to operate overtly in Lvov after the Soviet and Polish armies
capture the city. The final negotiations between the AK leadership and the
Soviet authorities lead to the arrest of Polish officers by the NKVD and to
the disarmament and internment of the AK detachments exposed in Lvov and in
the provinces. September
1944 — the UPA leadership issues its first orders to limit the
scope of the anti-Polish ethnic cleansing. 1944/1945 —
another wave of raids on the Polish localities in the Tarnopol
Voivodeship (e.g., several thousand Polish victims
in Wichrowica). May
1945 — the “Vovky” UPA company
conducts a series of massacres in the Lublin region (e.g., several dozen
Polish victims in Borydyca); this series is
regarded as the epilogue of the anti-Polish purges. March−June
1944 — UPA detachments arrive in the Lublin region. A
Polish-Ukrainian frontline is formed. Mutual raids on local rural communes
result in several thousand Polish and Ukrainian victims. The
night of March 9−10, 1944 — Polish attack on the
Ukrainian village of Sahryń. March
15, 1944 — 33 Poles are killed at the train station in Gozdów by a local OUN armed group consisting of former
policemen in German service. February−April
1945 — a wave of mutual attacks on Ukrainian and Polish
villages along the line stretching from Lubaczów to
as far as Sanok. March−April
1945 — the Polish attack on the Ukrainian village of Powłokoma (365 victims) and the subsequent UPA raid
of the Polish village of Wązownica (ca. 100
Polish victims). Criminal Investigations
Genocide is a legal
category. The Volhynian massacres have all the
traits of genocide listed in the 1948 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment
of the Crime of Genocide, which defines genocide as an act “committed with
intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or
religious group, as such.” In Polish academia the Volhynian
massacres are referred to as genocidal ethnic cleansings, the Volhynian (or Volhynian-Galician)
slaughter, or, in legal terminology, the crime of genocide. Regardless of
which qualification of the Volhynian massacres is
the most suitable, there is no doubt that the crimes committed by the OUN-B
and the UPA were anti-Polish ethnic cleansings of a genocidal character. The
public prosecutors of the investigation division of the Institute of National
Remembrance (Instytut Pamięci
Narodowej, IPN) are conducting 32 investigations
regarding the Ukrainian nationalists’ crimes against Polish citizens. These
crimes have been recognized as a crime against humanity in its special form,
that is, genocide. Article 118 § 1 of the Polish Penal Code of 1997, which
introduced the notion of genocide into Polish domestic law, serves as the
legal basis for these investigations. Polish-Ukrainian Historical
Disputes over the Volhynian Massacres
The anti-Polish drive of the pro-Bandera Ukrainian
underground during World War II, together with the subsequent Polish retaliation
it largely spawned, undoubtedly mark the bloodiest period of the
Polish-Ukrainian conflict in the 1940s. This conflict raged in territories
which were within Poland’s interwar borders (basically, the country’s
south-east), and which, taken as a whole, had nearly co-equal Polish and
Ukrainian populations. We use the word “conflict” because there was obvious
antagonism between Poles and Ukrainians, and they waged a fight for land –
even though they had been citizens of the same state (the Second Republic of
Poland, 1918-1939). “Conflict” is thus one of the terms used to describe what
happened between Poles and Ukrainians during World War II. The perpetrators — Bandera’s Organization of Ukrainian
Nationalists (OUN-B) and its military wing, that is, the Ukrainian Insurgent
Army (UPA) — used the codename “anti-Polish operation” in their documents in
to refer to the planned extermination of the Poles. Bandera’s followers
carried this aim out during 1943−1945 on the disputed territories of Volhynia, Eastern Galicia, and the south-eastern Lublin
region (centered on Chełm), which they
regarded as “indigenously Ukrainian.” The present-day state of the
Polish-Ukrainian historical debate on the topic is therefore but one proof of
how complex the matter is. The endless publicist discussion, which is often
accompanied by negative emotions, continues to heat up the historical debate.
Thus, the echoes of those tragic events continue to have a significant
influence on political decisions in Poland and Ukraine with regard to
commemoration of the victims – for indeed, they have become an element of the
Polish-Ukrainian conflict of memory. Further reading:
·
Volhynian Massacres - Basic Information (PDF) ·
Ewa Siemaszko
- The July 1943 genocidal operations of the OUN-UPA in Volhynia
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