W. R.
03-28-2010, 04:38 AM
Vasyl Kuk talks to a correspondent of “Maydan-Inform” (Kyiv, 16.12.2006). Deciphering of the recording.
M.-I.: Do there exist any documents of resolutions of OUN executives, bylaws of the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council or orders within UPA on liquidation of Poles in Volhynia? How did it happen, what is blamed on Ukrainians, how did it happen, how did you see it?
Vasyl Kuk: How did all this happen... In real life everything is much simpler than politicians say later. What Poles did to us in Volhynia is well-known. Our guy marries a girl. Poles come, take place at the table, eat and drink everything because they are the authority in the village. It happened that they raped that girl, who was getting married because they did what they wanted. Such things happened. But it is not essential. Essential were lands. There were no Polish colonists in Volhynia. In Volhynia there were landlords. When landlords’ lands were partitioned, these lands were taken over by colonists from Poland. It is obvious that it was hostile element, or people, who had served in the Border Protection Corp, and they received the land on very cheap and advantageous conditions. As the result in every village half of the land was owned by non-native colonists – alien people, who had not been in Volhynia before. That’s why there existed such a hatred for the land – and fight for land is always very fierce – that’s why that existed. As long as in those villages there resided Polish troops – and they collaborated with the Soviet guerrillas – the countrymen could do nothing about them.
If (when) we destroyed and drove out the troops, then peasants with spades, with pitchforks, with axes attacked the Poles. And then it was difficult to stop them: there was such a reaction, “Why did you come here? Who asked you here? You have taken our land.” The land was the cause, and remembering what had been done to them, it was the peasants who attacked the colonists. There was no order to murder Poles. And I’ll tell you a certain thing: because of what had happened in Volhynia Klyachkivsky was called up and there was an intention to put him on trial: how could he did something like that? When he told them (I also told them what was the matter, because I also was in Volhynia then) – then all the accusations were lifted. But I say there was even an intention to put him on trial because we are against the national hatred, but here the hatred is not in race, but in the social relations, which had been created by Poles before those happenings. And those were the consequences of their policy of colonisation. What I am saying you can like or dislike, but I’m telling you what took place and what my opinion is.
M.-I.: We came here not for judging your opinion but to note it down and this is what is important for us now.
Vasyl Kuk: I say again: there was no order to slaughter Poles; it was the resentment of peasants because of the Polish policy in the previous years, the fight for the land. And in any case do not forget that there was Bereza Kartuska (concentration camp near Brest – editorial note), where people were taken on suspicion, not because they committed a crime. And all that caused respective hatred. And now further – everything what was in the western lands, it all is ours, Poland is here, Lviv is a Polish city, the lands are ours, and you Ukrainians are nothing here. And correspondingly, when ratio of powers changes, when it is inverted, then if we have the power then you are nothing. It is the principle of human relationships: if you humiliate a person, because you are in power, you can expect that he’ll humiliate you when he is in power.
SOURCE (http://www2.maidan.org.ua/news/index.php3?bn=maidan_pressk&key=1167240386&action=view)
M.-I.: Do there exist any documents of resolutions of OUN executives, bylaws of the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council or orders within UPA on liquidation of Poles in Volhynia? How did it happen, what is blamed on Ukrainians, how did it happen, how did you see it?
Vasyl Kuk: How did all this happen... In real life everything is much simpler than politicians say later. What Poles did to us in Volhynia is well-known. Our guy marries a girl. Poles come, take place at the table, eat and drink everything because they are the authority in the village. It happened that they raped that girl, who was getting married because they did what they wanted. Such things happened. But it is not essential. Essential were lands. There were no Polish colonists in Volhynia. In Volhynia there were landlords. When landlords’ lands were partitioned, these lands were taken over by colonists from Poland. It is obvious that it was hostile element, or people, who had served in the Border Protection Corp, and they received the land on very cheap and advantageous conditions. As the result in every village half of the land was owned by non-native colonists – alien people, who had not been in Volhynia before. That’s why there existed such a hatred for the land – and fight for land is always very fierce – that’s why that existed. As long as in those villages there resided Polish troops – and they collaborated with the Soviet guerrillas – the countrymen could do nothing about them.
If (when) we destroyed and drove out the troops, then peasants with spades, with pitchforks, with axes attacked the Poles. And then it was difficult to stop them: there was such a reaction, “Why did you come here? Who asked you here? You have taken our land.” The land was the cause, and remembering what had been done to them, it was the peasants who attacked the colonists. There was no order to murder Poles. And I’ll tell you a certain thing: because of what had happened in Volhynia Klyachkivsky was called up and there was an intention to put him on trial: how could he did something like that? When he told them (I also told them what was the matter, because I also was in Volhynia then) – then all the accusations were lifted. But I say there was even an intention to put him on trial because we are against the national hatred, but here the hatred is not in race, but in the social relations, which had been created by Poles before those happenings. And those were the consequences of their policy of colonisation. What I am saying you can like or dislike, but I’m telling you what took place and what my opinion is.
M.-I.: We came here not for judging your opinion but to note it down and this is what is important for us now.
Vasyl Kuk: I say again: there was no order to slaughter Poles; it was the resentment of peasants because of the Polish policy in the previous years, the fight for the land. And in any case do not forget that there was Bereza Kartuska (concentration camp near Brest – editorial note), where people were taken on suspicion, not because they committed a crime. And all that caused respective hatred. And now further – everything what was in the western lands, it all is ours, Poland is here, Lviv is a Polish city, the lands are ours, and you Ukrainians are nothing here. And correspondingly, when ratio of powers changes, when it is inverted, then if we have the power then you are nothing. It is the principle of human relationships: if you humiliate a person, because you are in power, you can expect that he’ll humiliate you when he is in power.
SOURCE (http://www2.maidan.org.ua/news/index.php3?bn=maidan_pressk&key=1167240386&action=view)