Iryna Herashchenko, the First Deputy Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine participated in the flower-laying ceremony for the Babyn Yar victims killed in 1941.
The ceremony was attended by the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko, his wife Maryna Poroshenko, the Prime Minister Volodymyr Hroisman, members of the Government, First Deputy Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Iryna Herashchenko, members of Parliament of Ukraine, members of the Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations, and public figures.
The participants of the ceremony laid flowers to the memorial plate and commemorated the deceased. They also placed a wreath with a ribbon painted in the national colors to the monument to the citizens and war prisoners executed by Nazis in the Babyn Yar.
MPs H.Hopko, H. Lohvinskyi, B.Bereza were also in attendance.
Iryna Herashchenko together with the Head of the Committee on Foreign Affairs Hanna Hopko and His Holiness, the Patriarch of Kyiv and All Rus’-Ukraine Filaret did honour to the memory of the prominent poetess Olena Teliga by her monument in the Babyn Yar.
The participants honored with a moment of silence the memory of the victims of Nazi atrocities.
Addressing the Ukrainian nation, President Poroshenko said:
"Dear compatriots!
Today, as every year on this day, we honor the memory of the Babyn Yar tragedy – the mass killing of civilians by Nazi occupationists in the city of Kyiv. We remember in our prayers the innocent victims, whose names – known and unknown – are forever etched on the bloody pages of history of World War II and the Holocaust. The Babyn Yar ravine became a place of eternal peace for more than 100,000 representatives of different nationalities – Jews, Ukrainians, Gypsies, and many others -- and consequently it became a place of our common memory, an impulse to preserve peace and interethnic harmony worldwide. Today, all of Ukraine – from the border that connects us with a democratic Europe to the border that separates us from the aggressor state – is a territory of tolerance, respect for the life and dignity of every person, as well as free development of representatives of various ethnic groups and religions. Having learned the bitter lessons of the past, Ukraine and the entire civilized world are united in their desire to protect humanity from the arbitrariness of totalitarian regimes and to guarantee the right of peoples to a safe life in dignity. Eternal memory to those innocently killed in Babyn Yar, all victims of Nazism. We remember, and we will prevent.
Never again!”