International Conference ‘Reconciliation in Central and Eastern Europe’ to Be Held in Warsaw

In the Warsaw center of Orthodox culture from October 2 to 4, 2013, an international conference “Reconciliation in Central and Eastern Europe: New Challenges” will be held as part of the project Reconciliation in Europe: The Task for Churches in Ukraine, Belarus, Poland, and Germany.”

The topic of the conference will be related to reconciliation in the central and eastern parts of Europe. An important impetus for the conference served recently published documents concerning Polish-Ukrainian relations, especially the “Joint Declaration on the Occasion of the 70th Anniversary of the Volyn Tragedy between the Roman Catholic and Greek Catholic Churches in Poland and Ukraine.”

Numerous publications and statements in the media – both in Poland and in Ukraine – illustrate the diversity of opinions and interpretations of historical events. Therefore, during the conference historians and experts will present the roots of the problem of the Polish-Ukrainian reconciliation and effects of the already achieved results from the Polish and Ukrainian historical perspective. They will also try to answer some basic questions: what is the Polish-Ukrainian problem; what are its roots; what has already been found out and agreed between Poland and Ukraine; at what stage are we, as a nation, in the process of reconciliation; what is important to resolve in the near future.

Participants of the conference, in addition to historians and experts from Ukraine, will include representatives of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, the Roman Catholic Church, and the German Evangelical Lutheran Church of Ukraine, the UGCC Information Department reported with reference to the Commission for Promoting Christian Unity.