Authorities and heads of Ukrainian Churches participate in “First Minutes of Peace” action
On May 8, 23:00, the memorial complex “National Museum of Ukrainian History in the Second World War”, hosted the event "First Minute of Peace.”
Together with the Head of State, representatives of the All-Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations, families of the Heroes of Heaven’s Hundred, the heroes of the present - Ukrainian soldiers who defended Ukraine against Russian aggression, government officials, representatives of the Presidential Administration, and the public participated in the action.
Petro Poroshenko noted that "today, Ukraine, along with other democratic states and peoples, commemorates all those deceased during the Second World War.
Russia celebrates the Victory Day in a militaristic frenzy, aggressively opposing the whole world, while we, on these days, together with all of Europe, honor the memory of the deceased.” “For them this war was won by Stalin. We think this war was won by people. As all post-war decades have proved, they need the victory over Hitler to conquer other countries. And the “liberators” either forgot to leave the liberated territories, or from time to time they broke in there on the tanks, as in Hungary at fifty-six, as in Czechoslovakia in the sixty-eighth. And we needed only our own freedom, our own independence, which we eventually got 46 years after the victory,” he said. He added that “they are celebrating in a militaristic frenzy, aggressively opposing the whole world, while we celebrate together with all of Europe.”
We say: “Never again.” They say: “We can repeat”. And this is not vain rhetoric, but a real cluttering of weapons, including the intimidation of Western countries by a nuclear strike,” said the President.
"The perpetual human memory of the enormous victims of the Second World War, of thousands of damaged cities and tens of thousands of burnt villages once again warns the world against the danger of repeating such a catastrophe,” the President said, adding that "every year, real witnesses of that war are getting everything less, and the youngest participants in those hostilities are in their nineties.”
“Today we proudly honor our most respected citizens - the people of this older, legendary generation ... The soldiers of all the armies who defeated Nazis, members of the Ukrainian liberation movement, rear workers, war children and martyrs of the Nazi persecution, all who survived the inhuman war of war,” said the President and congratulated everyone on the Day of Remembrance and Reconciliation and the Day of Victory over Nazism in the Second World War.
The Head of State wished the whole world. “It is precisely on these days when it becomes very clear that for the country the wishes of peace are essential - as well as the wishes of health for a person,” Petro Poroshenko summed up.
