U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday welcomed a joint participation by Russian and Polish prime ministers in commemorating the massacre of Polish prisoners by Soviet security service in 1940.
Russia's Vladimir Putin and Poland's Donald Tusk took part in ceremonies in Katyn forest near the Russian city of Smolensk, where thousands of officers, police and civilians taken prisoner during the 1939 partitioning of Poland by the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany were killed by the NKVD, a forerunner to the KGB.
The Katyn massacre, which the Soviet Union tried to blame on Nazi Germany, has been a painful issue in relations between Poland and Russia. Clinton said the meeting could help heal the division, which has made Poland the strongest critic of post-Soviet Russia in Europe.
"This meeting of the current generation of Polish and Russian leaders is a sign of a much better present and of the hope for an increasingly bright and peaceful future," Clinton said. "We welcome the strengthening of the Russian-Polish relationship this mutual tribute symbolizes, and hope that it promises the continued growth of cooperation in Europe."
WASHINGTON, April 7 (RIA Novosti)
