In the town of Mostyska, close to the Polish border, the IPN delegation paid tribute to the heroes who fell defending Lwów (now Lviv, Ukraine) in the autumn of 1939. The ceremony comes after the successful exhumations of Polish solders at a disused cemetery in Lviv-Zboishcha, and their subsequent reburial with full military honours in August 2025.

The exhumations and reburials were the result of research carried out in Lviv by the IPN’s Search and Identification Office in the autumn of 2019. At the time – despite the burial site having been unequivocally identified and all formal requirements having been met – permission for exhumation was not granted. It was only after five years of efforts that consent was finally granted in June 2025.

The Polish Army soldiers buried in Mostyska fought against the Wehrmacht on the northern outskirts of Lviv on 16 and 17 September 1939. During the exhumation work in 2025, undertaken by the IPN with the support of a forensic medicine expert from the Medical University of Wrocław, two mass graves were uncovered, containing the remains of 31 people, as well as numerous scattered remains believed to belong to several dozen further victims.

Numerous items of military equipment and uniforms (including military buttons, belts and gas masks) were found alongside the remains, as well as personal effects (medals, rosaries and Polish coins).

Additionally, during the visit to Ukraine, Dr Karol Polejowski paid tribute to the heroes buried at the Cemetery of the Lwów Eaglets (Cmentarz Orląt Lwowskich). The delegation lit candles at the symbolic graves of General Tadeusz Rozwadowski and Colonel Czesław Mączyński – the commanders of the city’s defence in November 1918.

The IPN’s Deputy President also paid tribute to the Unknown Polish Soldier, whose remains were exhumed from Lwów in October 1925 to be laid to rest beneath the colonnade of the Saxon Palace in Warsaw.