15 November 2007
Ukraine has presented Israel with hundreds of previously classified documents detailing mass grave sites of Jews murdered during the Holocaust in the former Soviet state. During a visit to Jerusalem the Ukrainian President, Viktor Yushchenko, gave Israeli President Shimon Peres a box containing documents and maps locating Jewish mass graves. Peres welcomed the move and said the documents would "shed light on one of the darkest periods of Jewish history and Ukrainian history". The papers also traced the fate of Jewish activists killed under Soviet rule in Ukraine. Yushchenko also handed over declassified papers about Jewish underground activities in Ukraine during the 1920s.
In an address to the Knesset Yushchenko said that Ukraine was firmly and categorically combating anti-Semitism, xenophobia, and intolerance. "It is necessary to wage a constant and uncompromising battle against this evil, which can poison any pure source," he said, adding that Ukraine would do everything to facilitate development of Jewish culture. "I firmly confirm that the Jewish heritage in Ukraine will always have the appropriate care and protection."
Yushchenko, whose father was a prison laborer in Auschwitz, also visited Yad Vashem.
