On February 28th, 1944 in the village of Huta Pieniacka over a thousand Poles were murdered. The investigation by the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) proved that the pacification was carried out by Ukrainian volunteers from the 4th SS Police Regiment together with the Ukrainian Insurgent Army's unit and a paramilitary unit consisting of Ukrainian nationalists.

On the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the crime, the Speaker of the Sejm Marek Kuchciński handed over a letter read out during the state ceremonies.

The events of 28 February 1944 were an unimaginable tragedy not only for those who lost their loved ones. The death of about a thousand people. Polish inhabitants of Huta Pieniacka and the Jews they were hiding is still an extremely painful, unhealed wound for all of us. It is all the more painful that for several decades there was a conspiracy of silence, a prohibition to tell the truth about this horrifying and cruel crime.

The debt of remembrance now being paid to innocent children. The elderly, men and women, all those who suffered an undeserved death is our duty to them and to their families. It is also our duty to the future, which we should build on the basis of respect for the values dearest to us, so that nothing like this ever happens again.

That is why I am grateful to the people involved in the preparation of the ceremony, as well as to everyone who cherishes the memory of the tragic fate of the victims of the crime in Huta Pieniacka.

 

Best regards

Marek Kuchciński