Human remains exhumed at site of controversial World War II massacres in Ukraine: "Each of them had their dreams"

August 3, 2026 / 10:33 AM EDT

/ CBS/AFP

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Beneath two now-deserted villages in western Ukraine — the site of World War II-era massacres — archaeologists are uncovering the bones at the heart of a dispute that has strained relations between Warsaw and Kyiv for years.Disagreements over what happened and who is responsible for the Volyn massacres have long cast a shadow over ties between the otherwise now close neighbors.Between 1943 and 1945, tens of thousands of civilians were killed by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) in territory occupied by Nazi Germany, according to Polish estimates of the toll.Warsaw calls it a "genocide" against the Polish minority, while Ukraine hails the UPA as freedom fighters, sees the events as a wartime "tragedy" and says that Ukrainians were killed in retaliation.The exact number of people killed at the time remains contested, but Poland's Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) estimates that about 100,000 people died in the 1943-45 anti-Polish campaign in the Volhynia, Eastern Galicia and Lublin regions. The institute also estimates that at least 10,000 died in Polish attacks of retaliation.Amid sunflower fields and forests, joint Polish-Ukrainian teams of archaeologists have been carefully excavating the remains of victims."We want to restore their first and last names ... to fulfil the duty that rests on us as heirs of those who were murdered here," said Karol Polejowski, deputy president of the IPN.