Polish interior minister lays cornerstone for Russian chapel commemorating executed Polish officers

Moscow, September 3, Interfax - Polish Interior Minister Jacek Cichocki and Ambassador to Russia Wojciech Zajaczkowski attended the cornerstone ceremony for a chapel at the Nilo-Stolbenskaya Pustyn monastery on Lake Seliger, where thousands of Polish POWs were held.

The chapel is dedicated to the icon of St. Mary of Czestochowa, one of Poland's most revered religious relics. Two stones at the entrance to the monastery, with Russian and Polish-language inscriptions saying that Polish POWs were held there, will be moved into the chapel, the monastery's senior priest told Interfax.

About 16,000 Polish officers from special services and punitive units were held at the monastery in 1930-40, he said, adding that 4,500 to 6,000 of them were executed in Tver following court verdicts while the rest were freed.

The participants in the ceremony said prayers in memory of the Polish officers.

"Seventy years on, we are praying together for the peace of the executed Polish officers' souls. Our future depends not only on the lessons of history, but on present-day events, as well. Together we must forget the former grudges, and learn to understand and support each other," Monastery Superior, Archimandrite Arkady (Gubanov) said at the ceremony.

"The tragedy that unfolded in 1939-40 came about through the evil will of the enemies of the people and Church and aimed to destroy fraternal ties and Christian love, he said..

Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia visited Poland in August in the first mission to that country to have been accomplished by a Russian patriarch. While in Poland he and President of the Polish Episcopal Conference Josef Michalik signed a joint message to the peoples of Poland and Russia.

The message urges believers in Poland and Russia to pray for forgiveness for the pain, injustice and evil done to each other, and says that it is the first and the most important step towards restoring mutual trust, without which no true human community can exist, or genuine reconciliation reached.