Poland’s Culture Minister Marta Cienkowska called the burial “a restoration of dignity to those who were deprived of it in the most inhuman way,” and said Polish and Ukrainian experts would continue the search for additional graves to give every victim a name and a resting place.
President Karol Nawrocki, in a letter read on-site, voiced hope that genuine Polish-Ukrainian reconciliation would take root, adding that the still-painful "wound of wartime killings in Volhynia, Podolia and Galicia must begin to heal."
Polish upper-house Speaker Małgorzata Kidawa-Błońska told mourners on Saturday the day marked an end to decades of silence and uncertainty for families who lacked graves to visit.
She said the burial closed a painful chapter of enforced silence from the communist era, while emphasizing that exhumations and commemoration must continue.
Kidawa-Błońska described a dignified burial as a Christian duty that restores humanity and eases generational pain.
She also paid tribute to the “Righteous,” Ukrainians who saved persecuted Poles and members of other nationalities.
Ukraine’s culture minister, Tetyana Berezhna, said the Volhynia killings were a tragedy for both nations and should be examined by historians.
She proposed a swift meeting of scholars from both countries, noting that families on both sides have a right to the truth.
Deputy Foreign Minister Oleksandr Mishchenko said Kyiv is ready to act for truth and justice and urged that the history not be used for political manipulation.
Excavations in Puzhnyky resumed after Ukraine lifted in November its ban on searches and exhumations of Polish war victims on its territory.
The work in Puzhnyky ran from April 23 to May 10 and uncovered the remains of at least 42 people, including women and children, according to the Polish organizers.
The effort was coordinated by the Freedom and Democracy Foundation, a Polish nongovernmental organization that supports historical research and commemoration projects, with specialists from the Pomeranian Medical University in Szczecin, northwestern Poland, the company Volhynian Antiquities and Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance (IPN).
Poland’s Ministry of Culture and National Heritage financed the work.
Photo: PAP/Artur Reszko
Researchers expect further searches this year, as evidence points to another grave site nearby.
The killings in Puzhnyky took place on the night of February 12–13, 1945, when units of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, known by its Ukrainian acronym UPA, attacked the village, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
Contemporary Polish accounts say the village had only a small number of able-bodied defenders at the time.
Different sources put the number of Polish victims between 50 and 120.
The formation involved was led by Petro Khamchuk, whose men operated as “Siry Vovky,” or Grey Wolves.
Khamchuk and his subordinates were never prosecuted. In total, UPA killings of Polish minority civilians from 1943 to 1945 resulted in some 100,000 deaths.
Polish civilian victims of a World War II massacre committed by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). Image: Władysława Siemaszków, Ludobójstwo, page 1294, from Henryk Słowiński collection, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
The ceremonies drew Polish and Ukrainian officials, including Poland’s chargé d’affaires in Kyiv, Piotr Łukasiewicz, and Paweł Kowal, chairman of the Polish lower house's Foreign Affairs Committee and head of the Council for Cooperation with Ukraine.
Cienkowska said genetic testing would help restore identities to the dead so relatives who lacked a place of mourning could finally light a candle.
The former Polish village of Puźniki in what is now western Ukraine. Photo: Krystian Maj/KPRM
Separately, exhumations concluded on August 30 at Lviv-Zboiska, where Polish Army soldiers fell in the defense of Lviv in September 1939.
Two mass graves were located with the remains of 31 people as well as additional scattered remains likely belonging to several dozen more.
Poland's Institute of National Remembrance said final numbers would follow anthropological and genetic analysis.
(rt/gs)
Source: IAR, PAP