Is it true that the grandfather of President of Poland Andrzej Duda was a fascist punisher?

In June 2022, the prosecutor general of Belarus Andrei Swede said that his department was studying the biography of the Polish president’s grandfather, who allegedly distinguished himself with particular cruelty in the Ukrainian punitive battalion. We checked whether this statement corresponds to real facts.

June 15, 2022 Belarusian State Information Agency "BelTA" He spoke about the speech of the Prosecutor General of Andrei Swede at the plenary meeting of the International Parliamentary Conference "Historical memory: a great victory produced by unity." The official, in particular, said: “We know the names of some living criminals, and they, using the protection of foreign states, are hidden on their territory. Despite this, we will seek their prosecution. Currently, we have information about the locations of at least 400 such persons. <...> Now we are actively documenting the activities of the Polish President of the Polish President Andrzej Duda, who was part of the Ukrainian punitive battalion, distinguished itself with particular cruelty primarily in the territory of the Minsk and Vitebsk regions. And the thesis about the genetic connection of Nazi criminals and their descendants is confirmed by indisputable evidence and facts. ”

This information was also distributed "RIA Novosti" Sputnik, "Moscow Komsomolets", News.ru, TV channel "Tsargrad"Moreover, in Facebook Since May, a photograph of a certain Mikhail Ivanovich Duda, represented as the grandfather of the Polish president, has been actively spreading. It is reported that Mikhail studied sabotage and terrorist affairs with Roman Shukhevich, was friends with Stepan Bandera and was awarded three times a cross of combat merit-the highest award of the Ukrainian rebel army (UPA).

To begin with, we turn to the personality of Mikhail (Mikhailo) Duda. Such a person really existed, and from his biographies On the website of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory, one can find out that Mikhailo Ivanovich Duda (pseudonym - Gromenko) was born in 1921 in the Lviv region, in 1937 he joined the organization of Ukrainian nationalists (OUN) and went through sabotage training, and since 1943 he was in the UPA. Having gained considerable authority among combat comrades, he died on July 7, 1950 during a landing into the territory of Ukraine, where he was supposed to collect the remains of broken units of the army and bring them abroad. In the book "Ukrainian Partisan War 1942–1960" specifiedThat Duda committed suicide after he was surrounded as a result of an unsuccessful landing with a parachute. It is a more difficult task to confirm his participation in the punitive battalion, however, the already active role of Duda in the UPA speaks for itself, taking into account the tragic history of this organization in relation to the Poles in the 1940s and, in particular, Volyn massacre. Thus, a replicated certificate of Mikhailo Duda does not very contradict the real facts, even the photograph with her is real.

Andrzej Duda was elected President of Poland in May 2015, but a few months before that, rumors about his grandfather-nationalist parted in the World Wide Web. It all started with Polish sites and social networks, and soon already on West Ukrainian The resources became possible to read about the biography and “combat merits” of the grandfather of the 16th President of Poland. Of course, in the first case, the context of the news was negative (the information could be thrown by the political opponents of Duda), but in the second it was served as an occasion for pride in the heroic compatriot. Nevertheless, back in February 2015, commenting on one of the tweets on this topic, Andrzej Duda wrote: “Complete crap. My grandfather Aloisiy Duda lived in an old Sonche, was a furious and died on July 1, 1992. ”

Can this be considered a full -fledged refutation? Not quite, because a person usually has two grandfathers, and relying only on the words of a politician during the pre -election campaign is not a better idea. The answer about the second grandfather can be obtained from the official biographies Duddy. Firstly, it is extremely rare that both grandfathers of a person wear the same surname. According to the biography, the grandfather of Andrzej Duda on the maternal line was a certain Nicodemus Milevsky, a participant in the Soviet-Polish war. The cousin of President Victor and his Uncle Lech were Polish partisans, that is, they fought against the Nazis. Lech participated in the Warsaw Uprising in 1944. In general, the history of the ancestors of Duda both in the paternal and the maternal line almost inextricably linked with Poland And he has no attitude to the current territory of Ukraine. Moreover, in the Polish press you can find photos Young Andrzej Duda, along with his elderly grandfather, obviously, they could not be a nestle, who died 22 years before the birth of the future president. In addition to everything in the same book, Ukrainian Partisan War 1942–1960, citing one of the main specialists in the history of the OUN and UPA Yuri Kirichuk reportedthat Mikhailo Duda was impotent and could not have children. Note that the surname Duda is enough Popular Both in Poland and in Ukraine.

Thus, all available sources say that Mikhailo Duda was not the grandfather of Polish President Andrzej Duda. Despite this, after the start of hostilities in Ukraine, Fake survived the second birth and was again refuted The fact of the Polish publication Demagog. They drew attention to the fact that this is the second myth of the origin of Duda. First He declared him a Jew named Aaron Feigenbaum, which was also a clear attack on a politician rating, whose homeland is traditionally High level anti -Semitic sentiments. We can put Andrzej Dudu on a par with German Chancellor Olaf Sholts and his fictional grandfather -esse.

Image on the cover: telegram channel rusint

Fake

What do our verdicts mean?

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