A "wreath" of murdered Polish children tied with barbed wire by the Ukrainian nationalists of UPA

The Western media is a shameless disgrace for several reasons. Apart from  the blatant blanket ban on any coverage of the Palestinian crisis and the cruel treatment of the Palestinians by Jewish supremacists, we now have the West turning a blind eye to the true nature of those behind the violent coup in Kiev. I refer to the use of reactionary neo-Nazis and other Ukrainian ultra-nationalists by the United States and elements from the European Union.

The support for the leaders of the violent coup in Ukraine has several aims but the most immediate is to contain Russia on its borders by the close proximity of NATO forces, against all previous agreements. Another is to create a situation whereby the United States can step into an energy vacuum created by them and sell their energy in the form of shale gas at sky high prices to Europe, including Britain.

The United States-backed coup regime in Kiev has been hoodwinked into accepting IMF largesse which means conditions placed on the people, driving the poor deeper into poverty through austerity measures imposed by the  usurers of the IMF. None of this loan from the IMF will benefit the people. It is the beginning of a debt cycle for the purpose of extracting all state assets in the event of a default on repayment. It is the old Rothschild trick and the reason that particular family is super-wealthy beyond all reason.

Most disconcerting is the existence of armed Ukrainian ultra-nationalist militias operating under a unitary command. The Right Sector is the prominent grouping among these neo-Nazis who take their ideology from nationalist movements operating during the Second World War.

On the eastern borderlands of Poland during the Second World War there was a terrible and cruel massacre of Polish men, women and children by the UPA, otherwise known as the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. Seventy years ago, the Polish populations of Volhynia and Eastern Galicia were targeted by Dmyto Klyachkivsky who commanded the Ukrainian Insurgent Army or UPA. The order was that all Polish males between the age of 16 and 60 were to be exterminated.

The UPA was part of the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists which was, in turn, led by Stepan Bandera, the leader who believed in a racially pure and unified Ukrainian nation with all foreigners in Ukraine, regarded as enemies, to be destroyed. At that time it was the Polish people. It was to include people from the Soviet Union, Germany and Czechoslovakia.

The terror unleashed upon the Polish villages was a “horrific carnage of unspeakable proportions” and “one of the most heinous massacres of the war”.

These Polish communities had no idea of what was to befall them as their Ukrainian neighbours kept the truth of the impending massacre from them.

The following massacres actually began in March of 1943 and continued throughout the years up to the end of the war.

The total of the Polish victims of ‘ethnic cleansing’ by the Ukrainian nationalists was 90,000. Around 50,000 in Volhynia alone. Women and children being the main targets of Ukrainian racial hatred.

Sadism was a regular feature of these Ukrainian extermination squads with the local Ukrainian population colluding with them. Women and children were often tortured and disfigured before being murdered. The level of cruelty surpassed anything the Nazis were ever to engage in during their military drive to the East.

It should be noted that the UPA and the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists had co-operated with the German forces against the Russian Red Army at one time.

But the excesses of the UPA became unacceptable even to the Germans.

Bandera’s OUN had ambitions that made your blood run cold.

According to a OUN order, “all traces of Polish establishments were to be completely erased. Foremost the destruction of Polish Roman Catholic churches, Polish homes and even trees and orchards that had been planted by Polish people ... so that there will be no trace that someone lived there".

Today’s Right Sector preach the exact same dangerous ideology but level it directly at the Russian speaking citizens.

They are targeting exclusively the Russian speaking communities within Ukraine and speak the very same language of violent ethnic cleansing ... all in the name of Ukrainian nationalism.

The murder of Russian speakers in the trade union building in Odessa where many died in the flames was an echo of UPA atrocities during the war.

In the crowds assembled in front of the burning building there were calls to let them burn alive, screaming abuse and profanities.

The UPA engaged in the burning of Polish houses with the entire families inside, too afraid to leave. The Odessa atrocity was an echo of this and the Ukrainian nationalists knew it. They revere Bandera quite openly, never apologise for the massacres of Polish villages and parade images of Bandera in street demonstrations.

These are the people who want to join the European Union where the idea of European co-operation is paramount.

The ideology of nationalism is one that speaks of exclusivity and supremacism. The Scottish nationalists use hatred again London and the South East of England in particular. No matter what they say, the Scottish brand of nationalism is based entirely on hatred for all things English. They hate us and do not want to be part of us.

Irish republicans harbour exactly the same anti-English sentiments.

They are dangerous because such emotive and visceral feelings can often lead to violence ... and in some cases, war.

The Svoboda party, the main nationalist party in Ukraine, is very much a part of the new government in Kiev and is calling for violence against Russian speakers. Already, armed groups of Right Sector neo-Nazis have been entering the Eastern regions with the aim of intimidating the civilian population. The Kiev coup government has even incorporated them into a National Guard to complement the Ukrainian army. Parallels with the murderous UPA can not be avoided.

The Ukrainians have never apologised for the many atrocities committed against the Polish communities. While Germany has paid the price for reparations and compensation to concentration camp survivors, Ukraine has got off scot-free ... and it is simply incredible that the EU should wish to expand in order to include this violent entity.

Celebrations of Bandera and the UPA/OUN militias are demonstrated openly and with enthusiasm. Nationalistic feeling is drummed up to fevour pitch on marches. Monuments have been put up to instil pride in their heroes of dubious moral reputation.

No one seems to stop and give some moments of thought for those Polish men, woman and children who were murdered for the sake of an “ethnically pure” Ukraine.

Spare a thought for the wretched children depicted in the photos on this page. Innocent little tots whose mothers were raped and butchered.

How was this possible, you might ask. It was made possible through a belief in an ideology. An ideology that called for some kind of purification and turned neighbours of many years standing into the demonised enemy. Friends and neighbours suddenly became “foreigners”.

We do not wish for such bigotry to exist in Europe ... a Europe that regards Russia as a friend and part of our broader system. Nationalism always divided nations. The geopolitics of the future requires unity.

The solution to the Ukrainian tragedy will not be enacted within Ukraine alone. Russia has the most valid interest in all that. No others.

copyright© Robert Edwards 2014