Founder of OUN Yevhen Konovalets to be reburied in Kyiv
The exhumation took place at a cemetery in Rotterdam.
Photo: Radio Svaboda
Yevhen Konovalets, the founder of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists in the 1930s, will be reburied in Kyiv. This was announced by the Office of the President of Ukraine.
The exhumation took place at a cemetery in Rotterdam. The coordination of the return of Konovalets' remains to Ukraine is being handled by the head of the President's Office Kyrylo Budanov and Minister of Foreign Affairs Andriy Sybiha.
The farewell ceremony will take place at the Greek Catholic Patriarchal Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ in Kyiv, after which Konovalets' ashes will be interred at the National Memorial Military Cemetery. The date of the ceremony has not yet been announced.
During the Civil War, Yevhen Konovalets commanded the formations of the Sich Riflemen. After 1920, in emigration, he became one of the leaders of Ukrainian nationalists, and in 1929, he founded the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN).
In 1938, Konovalets was killed in a bomb explosion. His assassination was organized by NKVD officer Pavel Sudoplatov, who later directed the operation to assassinate Leon Trotsky.
In May, another OUN leader, Andriy Melnyk, was reburied at the National Memorial Military Cemetery in Ukraine.