The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry has commented on the adoption of the law banning the "propaganda of banderism [after WWII Ukrainian nationalist leader Stepan Bandera]" by the lower house of the Polish parliament, Sejm.
"The Foreign Ministry is deeply concerned by the Polish Sejm's adoption on 26 January of the bill 'On the introduction of amendments to the law on the Institute of National Memory – the commission for the persecution of crimes against the Polish people and some other laws'. Unfortunately, the Ukraine issue has once again been used in Poland's domestic policy while the tragic pages of our common historical past continue to be politicized," the Foreign Ministry said.
According to the statement, Ukraine flatly rejects yet another attempt at the unilateral interpretation of historical events, including the wrong use of the name of a part of modern Ukraine in an official Polish document".
"We would like to remind the authors of the bills that Ukrainians, just like Poles, extremely suffered from totalitarian regimes during WWII and spared no effort fighting for the freedom of their Motherland. In this context, we are extremely concerned by an intention to portray Ukrainians exclusively as 'criminal nationalists' and 'Third Reich collaborationists," the statement reads.
Ukraine hopes for political wisdom on the part of the Polish upper house which is to consider the bill soon.