Zelensky, Duda commemorate victims of Volyn Massacre in Lutsk

On July 9, President Volodymyr Zelensky and his Polish counterpart Andrzej Duda commemorated the victims of the 1943 Volyn (Volhynia) Massacre during their surprise visit to Lutsk, a regional capital in northwestern Ukraine.

"Together, we honor all the innocent victims of Volyn (Massacre). Memory unites us! Together we are stronger!" Zelensky wrote on Telegram.

The members of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), the military wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, or OUN, massacred thousands of Poles throughout Volhynia in Nazi-occupied Poland — an area that is now part of western Ukraine — in the spring and summer of 1943.

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While most of the victims were Poles, some Ukrainians were also killed by Poles in retaliation. Ukrainian historian Serhii Plokhy, director of the Ukrainian Research Institute at Harvard University, estimates that the number of Ukrainians killed may vary between 15,000 and 30,000, while the estimates for the Polish victims vary between 60,000 and 90,000.

In 2016, Poland's Parliament recognized the killings as genocide, a term that Ukraine denies.

Earlier on June 28, Duda also made an unannounced visit to Kyiv to meet with Zelensky.