Poland buries wartime remains in western Ukraine as part of reconciliation

PUZHNYKY, Ukraine (Reuters) -Remains of Poles killed by Ukrainian nationalist insurgents during World War Two were buried in western Ukraine on Saturday as officials from both countries looked on, a move to ease a rare strain in relations between the two close allies.

Poland was allowed to exhume the remains in the former Polish village of Puzniki, in present-day Ukraine, earlier this year after longstanding demands from Warsaw over the issue, which has caused friction between the neighbouring countries.

With Polish Catholic priests officiating, the simple wooden coffins of 42 Poles, each marked with a cross and flanked by wooden cross, were placed in a long, narrow grave in a wooded, abandoned cemetery.

Lanterns and wreaths draped in Polish red and white and Ukrainian yellow and blue colours were laid alongside.

"The victims of the Puzniki massacre rested in an unmarked grave for decades, but their memory endures for their loved ones and those who fought for this remembrance, truth, and act of elementary justice," Polish Culture Minister Marta Cienkowska was quoted as saying by state news agency PAP.

"Today's burial is a restoration of dignity to those who had it stripped from them in the most inhumane way."

Cienkowska expressed confidence that it would be possible to locate and identify remaining victims, according to PAP.

Survivor Maria Jarzycka-Wroblewska, 90, said groups of men had assured residents they would be safe and then the killings occurred overnight.

"No one in my immediate family was murdered here, but neighbours, friends and even a distant cousin were," she said.

"Thank God that the Ukrainian authorities and the Poles came to an agreement and this is finally done...You cannot put all Ukrainians in the same basket."

The abandoned village is among sites where Polish officials say more than 100,000 people were killed by insurgents between 1943 and 1945.

Large swathes of modern-day western Ukraine were under Polish control at the time. The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which fought against both Nazi German forces and the Soviet Red Army, is widely held responsible for the killings as part of efforts to limit Polish influence over the area.

The so-called Volhynia massacres have complicated relations even as Poland has backed Ukraine against Russia's 2022 invasion by supplying weapons and taking in almost a million refugees.

Ukraine has rejected Poland's description of the killings as "genocide", saying thousands of Ukrainians were also killed in events that were part of a wider conflict between the neighbours.

The exhumations involving around 20 specialists had been aimed at identifying victims and burying them. Polish officials have called on Ukraine to allow more operations to take place.

(Additional reporting by Alan Charlish in Warsaw; Writing by Dan Peleschuk and Ron Popeski, Editing by Franklin Paul)