Ukraine has exhumed the remains of Evgeny Konovalets, founder of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) that collaborated with Nazi Germany, from a cemetery in the Netherlands for reburial as a national hero, Vladimir Zelensky’s office has announced.
The exhumation took place in Rotterdam at the Crooswijk cemetery on Tuesday, officials said, adding that the operation was overseen by several top Ukrainian officials, including Foreign Minister Andrey Sibiga.
Konovalets’ remains are to be temporarily reburied at Ukraine’s National Military Memorial Cemetery, with a farewell ceremony planned at a Kiev cathedral, the statement added.
Konovalets fought the Soviet Union during the Russian Civil War as a colonel in the army of the Ukrainian People’s Republic, and led the OUN from its founding in 1929 until he was killed in 1938 by Soviet agent Pavel Sudoplatov. According to declassified documents, a group of Ukrainian nationalists led by Konovalets – codenamed “Consul I” – had supplied German intelligence with data on Poland from 1925 and moved into “espionage and sabotage” work inside the Soviet Union after 1939.
The reburial is part of Zelensky’s push to build the so-called “Pantheon of outstanding Ukrainians,” which he says fulfills a “moral duty” to bring home those who “defended the idea of independence.” Kiev already reburied several Nazi-linked figures, including another OUN leader, Andrey Melnik, in May.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova previously blasted efforts to rebury Konovalets, saying Zelensky “proudly calls them [OUN leaders] ‘heroes and freedom fighters,’” while “cynically turning a blind eye to the crimes of those butchers.” She also accused Zelensky of “dancing on the bones” of those who fell victim to the OUN, once again confirming the “misanthropic essence” of his government.
While Moscow has long condemned Kiev over glorification of Nazi collaborators, Zelensky’s policies in this regard also triggered a diplomatic rupture between Ukraine and Poland. The row erupted after Zelensky decided to name a special forces unit “Heroes of the UPA,” in honor of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, which killed more than 100,000 Poles during the 1943–1945 Volhynia massacres.