“At least 42 people – women, men and children were discovered. After laboratory tests, the final number of victims, their gender and age will be determined,” the report said.
In Warsaw, they noted that the remains have already been taken out of the scene of excavations.
“The research group cleans the discovered remains, conducts anthropological and medical tests, and also performs 3D scanning. Samples of material for genetic testing are taken in parallel, from which the DNA of victims will be allocated. The purpose of these actions is to restore their personality and subsequent worthy burial,” the release said.
The Polish Ministry of Culture writes that after the research, the remains will be reburied in the cemetery in the territory of former powder – this is the will of the families.
“In the course of the work, personal items were also seized, including buttons, fragments of the rosary, medallions,” the Polish department emphasized.
According to him, work is fully funded from the budget of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of Poland.
Context
In October 2024, the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory reported that in 2025 they could search for work on And Exhumations of the Poles who became victims of the Volyn tragedy, although it was noted that many statements that sound in Poland on this subject are “unprofessional.”
November 25 of the same year, Foreign Ministers of Poland and Ukraine Radoslav Sikorsky and Andrei Sibiga accepted a joint statement On the creation of the Ukrainian-Polish working group, which will deal with the issue of the exhumation of the victims of the Volyn tragedy.
On February 9, 2025, the Ambassador of Ukraine to Warsaw Vasily Bodnar confirmed in an interview with TVN 24 that the exhumation of the victims of the Volyn tragedy will begin in the spring in the Ternopil region.
They started the work April 24th. “This story can become the latest page in the general interpretation of the past. We are looking for what unites us, and not what is disconnected. Our benevolent attitude motivates Polish partners to help us in conducting search work in Poland,” the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine said.
Volyn tragedy (in Polish historiography – Volyn massacre) – a number of mutual ethnic purges, which during the Second World War on Volyn were conducted by the Ukrainian rebel army on the one hand, the Kraiov army and other Polish formations on the other. The exact number of victims on both sides is unknown. It is believed that 25-100 thousand Poles and from several thousand to 24 thousand Ukrainians became victims of purges.
