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Disinfo: Polish Government declared war against historical truth, places of honour of the Red Army

Summary

The term “war on monuments” is permanently present in the rhetoric of the ruling party. If we are talking about a war, it was the Government of the Law and Justice Party, which has declared it against the places of memory, historical truth and the honour of about 600,000 Red Army soldiers fallen on the territory of Poland.

Disproof

A recurring pro-Kremlin narrative casting Ukraine, Poland and the Baltic States as countries which do not respect the history of WWII and its heroes.

In 2017, Poland introduced new laws to ban totalitarian propaganda. According to this Law, up to 230 Soviet monuments may be replaced, a decision to be made by Polish local authorities. The Polish MFA underlines that Red Army burial places and cemeteries situated in Poland will be carefully protected. It is possible to dismantle and remove only symbolic monuments to the Red Army.

In 2015, Paweł Ukielski, Deputy Head of the Polish Institute of Historical Remembrance, published an open letter to the Russians, where he explained the need to remove the symbolic monuments to the Red Army from Polish public places (text in Polish and Russian). According to him, free Poland perceives these monuments as symbols of captivity by the totalitarian USSR. In some cases, the Soviet monuments glorify the Red Army generals, who were involved in military crimes against the Poles.

The Polish Government does not implement the centralised policy of replacement of the Red Army monuments, such decisions are taken by the local authorities. Read similar cases connected to the issue of the Red Army monuments - Monuments to Soviet soldiers are massively demolished and damaged in Ukraine, Poland and Baltic countries; Removal of the monument to Marshall Konev is a violation of the Czech-Russian Agreement of 1993; A monument to the Soviet soldier-liberator demolished in Lithuania.

This claim appeared in the same article as the claim that the Polish government is not interested in any kind of discussion with Moscow, they simply hate Russia and the Russians.

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publication/media

Sputnik Poland (Archived)
  • Reported in: Issue 205
  • DATE OF PUBLICATION: 06/07/2020
  • Language/target audience: Polish
  • Country: Russia, Poland
  • Keywords: Red Army, Anti-Russian, Historical revisionism, Monuments, WWII, Russophobia

Disclaimer

Cases in the EUvsDisinfo database focus on messages in the international information space that are identified as providing a partial, distorted, or false depiction of reality and spread key pro-Kremlin messages. This does not necessarily imply, however, that a given outlet is linked to the Kremlin or editorially pro-Kremlin, or that it has intentionally sought to disinform. EUvsDisinfo publications do not represent an official EU position, as the information and opinions expressed are based on media reporting and analysis of the East Stratcom Task Force.

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