Kiev court declares the symbols of the 1st Galicia SS division as not to be Nazi symbols

24.09.2020, Kiev.

The Kiev Administrative Court of Appeal allowed the appeal of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory in connection with the recognition of the 1st Galicia SS division’s symbols as Nazi symbols on September 23, Director of the Ukrainian Jewish Committee Eduard Dolinsky wrote on his Facebook page.

“The 6th Administrative Court of Appeal allowed the appeal of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory and reversed the decision of the lower court,” Dolinsky wrote. “Now the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory can safely glorify the 1st Galicia SS division,” he added.

According to Dolinsky, the full text of the court decision will be published on September 28.

Recall that the 1st Galician SS Division (14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS) was part of Nazi Germany’s Waffen SS. The division recruited Ukrainian volunteers, who swore an oath to Adolf Hitler. Units and subunits of the 1st Galician SS Division took an active part in hostilities against partisans in France, Poland, former Yugoslavia, and Western Ukraine. These units took part in Nazi punitive operations in south-eastern Poland. Militants of the SS “Galicia” division committed war crimes and crimes against humanity. The 1st Galician SS Division was part of the Waffen-SS, an elite unit of the wartime German Armed Forces. According to the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, the Waffen-SS was ruled to be a criminal organization, and its members were convicted accordingly.

In May 2020, the Kiev District Administrative Court, in a lawsuit filed by a resident of the Ukrainian capital, declared that the division’s symbols were Nazi symbols and banned the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory from spreading false information about the division.

Source: Rossa Primavera News Agency

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