UPA Soldiers’ Memorial Damaged Again as Police Search for Suspects

Police are searching for those who damaged a monument and burial site for Ukrainian Insurgent Army soldiers at Białystok woodland in Hrubieszów County, southeastern Poland. The soldiers died fighting the NKVD in 1946.

According to preliminary findings, unknown perpetrators damaged inscriptions on a stone obelisk in Białystok village, in the Dołhobyczów municipality, on Sunday. Police are investigating possible desecration of a monument and the resting place of Ukrainian soldiers, as well as national hatred and property damage. No arrests have been made.

The site has been vandalized before. Several weeks ago, authorities found that the monument had been spray-painted and that the arch decorating it had been cut away. Poland’s Interior and Administration Ministry said investigators secured physical evidence, including a spray-paint can, an alcohol bottle and a T-shirt. They also found the removed arch in nearby bushes.

The Ukrainian Embassy in Poland condemned that earlier vandalism, saying memorial sites must be treated with respect despite the difficult and tragic chapters in the two countries’ shared history. The Lublin Voivodeship Office said the UPA grave in Dołhobyczów municipality does not appear in the voivode’s official register of war graves and cemeteries.

Forty-one UPA soldiers are buried at Białystok woodland near Liski. They were killed in February 1946 while fighting an NKVD unit. The first memorial at the site probably dates from 1996 or 1997. A large granite stone bearing Ukraine’s emblem, an inscription and details of those buried there was installed on the grave in 2019. The local Ukrainian population was largely displaced during Operation Vistula in 1947.

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Regardless of the difficult and tragic chapters of our shared history, burial and memorial sites should remain outside political disputes and be treated with respect.