Bandera and Wołyń. The president submitted to the Sejm a draft amendment to the Act on the Institute of National Remembrance and the Penal Code

Preventing the promotion of the ideology of flagship and denying the Volhynia crime are aimed at amending the Act on the Institute of National Remembrance and the Penal Code transferred on Monday by President Karol Nawrocki to the Sejm.

As written in the justification of the amendment, the proposed amendment in the Act on the Institute of National Remembrance – the Commission of Prosecution of Crime against the Polish Nation consists in “clarifying the provisions determining the concept of crimes made by members and colleagues of the organization of the Ukrainian nationalists of the Bandera Fraction and the Ukrainian insurgent army and other Ukrainian formations collaborating with the Third German” disseminating false claims in this regard.

“The introduction of the proposed change will contribute to more effective criminal proceedings against persons denying the crime of genocide committed by the OUN Fraction of Bandera and UPA,” the justification was written.

The amendment to the Act is also related to the planned changes in the Penal Code. The changes are to be added in an article, which provides for a penalty of up to 3 years imprisonment for promoting totalitarianisms and calling to hatred, phrases: “The same punishment is subject to who publicly promotes (…) the ideology of the organization of Ukrainian nationalists of the Bandera Fraction and the Ukrainian insurgent army or ideology that calls for life for life political or social. “

“For Poland, bandryism has a special and painful dimension. It was directly aimed at Poles living in the Eastern Borderlands, who were recognized as an obstacle to the implementation of the nationalist vision of Ukraine. The memory of Volyn slaughterhouses and other crimes remains an integral part of Polish history and collective identity” – emphasized in the justification.

The draft act also assumes an increase in the penalty for illegal crossing of the state border and organizing it to other people. The changes are to raise the upper limit of punishment for illegal crossing the border in the form of absolute imprisonment from 3 years to 5 years. It is also proposed to increase the amount of imprisonment in the case of organizing other persons to other persons exceeding against the provisions of the border of the Republic of Poland. A person who deals with this procedure will be punishable by imprisonment from 2 to 12 years.

The proposal shows, as it was written, from the need to take decisive action by Poland, which should launch any means to block this practice, especially in the face of the ongoing full -glass war in Ukraine caused by Russia. (PAP)

ZP/ ASZW/ MHR/