Head of UGCC: 'Mass killings and executions continue wherever Russian occupiers advance'
This was reported by the UGCC Department for Information.
The head of the Church stated that the enemy is constantly attempting to destroy the infrastructure of our cities, day and night. He noted that the massive attacks on Kyiv have been the most tragic.
His Beatitude Sviatoslav expressed his condolences to the families of all those who have lost their lives. He noted that during this time, our Church and the Ukrainian people are prayerfully commemorating the victims of one of the darkest chapters in our history. On June 22, 1941, Nazi Germany launched its attack on the Soviet Union, which left deep wounds on our people.
"In the prisons of Western Ukraine, the Soviet repressive authorities carried out the mass execution of more than 22,000 people — members of the Ukrainian intelligentsia, civic and religious leaders, priests, and other prisoners. One of the most tragic chapters of those events was the Chortkiv-Uman tragedy. In Chortkiv, the Soviet repressive authorities shot about 900 prisoners, while nearly a thousand others were forced to march on foot along the ‘road of death’ to Uman — a distance of nearly 400 kilometers. They walked without clothes or shoes, exhausted and tortured. About 200 people were shot along the way, and those who reached Uman were executed in the courtyard of the NKVD prison..."
His Beatitude Sviatoslav emphasized, "We remember so that such tragedies will never happen again. We pray and bear witness to the world about these crimes so that the truth may be heard and no nation will ever again suffer such horrors."
