Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs criticized the decision to rebury OUN leader Andrii Melnyk in Kyiv, stating his alleged collaboration with the Nazis. The statement was published on the social media platform X.
Source: “Espreso”
The ministry said it regretted the holding of an official ceremony and stressed the importance of preserving historical memory about the victims of Nazism and its collaborators.
The statement was also commented on by the current head of the OUN, Bohdan Chervak. In his column, he called the Israeli MFA’s position provocative and, in his view, aligned with Russian propaganda narratives. He called for the statement to be withdrawn and for an apology to Ukraine.
Chervak recalled historical episodes in which similar accusations against Melnyk, according to him, had already been refuted by Ukrainian organizations and some international media outlets.
Separately, Andrii Illienko, an officer of the “Svoboda” battalion, stated that issues of reburial and historical memory are an internal matter of Ukraine. He also criticized Israel’s position, referring to its own international challenges and its stance on Russia’s aggression against Ukraine.
For reference: Andrii Melnyk was a Ukrainian military and political figure of the 20th century, a colonel in the Ukrainian People’s Republic army, and one of the leaders of the Ukrainian nationalist movement. After World War II, he lived in exile in Europe and died in 1964 in Cologne.
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