Ukrainian president says bilateral committee could help ease tension with Poland

The offer comes amid tensions over historical issues between Poland and Ukraine.

The committee, headed by officials appointed by the two presidents, is expected to prevent problems from escalating and to boost the countries’ strategic partnership.

The Ukrainian leader said he wanted to resolve differences “in a civilised fashion”.

Poroshenko’s spokesperson, Sviatloslav Ceholko, said that recent statements by Polish politicians raised public concern and could not be left unanswered.

Polish President Andrzej Duda said on Tuesday that Kiev should ensure that people who openly proclaim anti-Polish views do not occupy senior positions in Ukrainian politics.

Last week, Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski said that officials in Poland were planning to ban “individuals with an extremely anti-Polish approach” from entering the country.

He suggested the ban would apply to Ukrainian officials who do not allow Polish experts to continue their search and exhumation work in Ukraine and who are preventing continued work to renovate sites in that country of significance to Poland.

“Individuals who use administrative instruments against Poland will also bear consequences," Waszczykowski said.

Ceholko reiterated a recent declaration made by the Ukrainian foreign ministry that there were no anti-Polish figures among the ranks of Ukraine’s authorities.

In late October, a Polish expert said that authorities in Ukraine were blocking work by a team of Poles searching for the remains of Polish victims of wartime crimes in that country.

This includes problems that Polish researchers are encountering as they search for the burial sites of Polish victims of the so-called Volhynia Massacre in Ukraine, Prof. Krzysztof Szwagrzyk, deputy head of Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance (IPN), said. (aba/gs)

Source: IAR