On November 18, 2024, a commemoration of the members of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (Banderites) shot by the Nazis in 1943 took place in the center of Ivano-Frankivsk. A large gathering of caring residents of the city took place on the street of Executed Nationalists near the monument to the victims of Nazi terror. The celebrations were attended by the mayor of the city, Ruslan Marcinkiv, the people’s deputy of Ukraine, Oksana Savchuk, the head of the Ivano-Frankivsk regional organization of the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists, Bohdan Borovych, the director of the Ivano-Frankivsk regional museum of the liberation struggle, Yaroslav Koretchuk, and others. Students and teachers of the Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University, students of lyceums in Ivano-Frankivsk, and representatives of patriotic public organizations were present also.
Bohdan Paska, Ph.D., a leading specialist at the Institute of History, Ethnology and Archaeology of the Carpathians, addressed the participants of the commemoration event. The scientist pointed out the importance of preserving the national memory of the Ukrainian people about the tragic events of the liberation struggle in the middle of the 20th century. According to the teacher, subsequent generations of fighters for the freedom of Ukraine were inspired by the feat of the OUN members, who were not afraid to defend the Ukrainian idea in conditions of foreign occupation. The attention of those present was drawn to the fact that exactly 54 years ago in Ivano-Frankivsk, the KGB massacre of the representative of the Ukrainian dissident movement Valentyn Moroz took place, who also fought for the independence of Ukraine in very difficult conditions of Soviet occupation. Bohdan Paska emphasized the role of historians-scientists of the Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University in the study of the Ukrainian national liberation movement of the 20th century and called on all young people present to join in the study of their native history.