— Poland like no other country is aware of the fact how does a war for national heritage ends: monuments, museums and libraries’ collections — says director of the Sybir Memorial Museum, Wojciech Śleszyński, PhD, DSc.
At the time of World War II as the country we lost — as the result of damages and stealing — priceless treasures of our culture, national souvenirs and the heritage of generations. We are aware that Ukraine is in such a situation today. When soldiers fight with the aggressor, doctors save wounded people and volunteers support civilians – culture workers try to save monuments, museums’ collections and documentary.
The Sybir Memorial Museum together with other polish museums organizes the Help for Ukrainian Museums Committee. Its tasks will be for instance supporting Ukrainian museums and culture institutions in saving and hiding monuments and culture souvenirs, digitalization and inventory of collection and documenting the damage and stealing of priceless souvenirs. Polish museums will also give materials needed to save and evacuate the collection.
The Sybir Memorial Museum is all the time in touch with the National Museum of the Holodomor-Genocide in Kyiv, so the Great Famine – famine caused by the soviet authorities which touched in 1932-1933 a few millions of Ukrainian lifes.
In 2019 in Bialystok we had as our guests the representatives of the Holodomor-Genocide museum and the exhibition related to the Great Famine in Ukraine prepared by their institution.
