In response to a question posed in an interview, Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, renewed his criticism of the joint presence of a Russian and a Ukrainian at the Pope’s Good Friday Via Crucis, even after their reflection was not read aloud.

“A reconciliation between the Polish and German peoples – initiated by the Catholic episcopate in the 1960’s—would not have been possible if the Nuremberg trials had not occurred, and if Nazism as an ideology had not been condemned,” the Major Archbishop said. “In our situation, any dialogue on reconciliation between Ukrainians and Russians can only take place when the Nuremberg trials are conducted over the present murderous ideology.”