Over the past two decades, Father Patrick Desbois, a French Catholic priest, has been identifying World War II atrocity sites, uncovering evidence of overlooked massacres. After doing similar work with the Yazidi victims of the Islamic State (IS) group in Iraq and Syria, he is now back in Ukraine, collecting testimonies from the victims of the Russian invasion.
Father Patrick Desbois’ mission to fight the bigotry that causes genocide began 20 years ago in the western Ukrainian city of Rava-Ruska near the Polish border. His grandfather was one of 25,000 French soldiers detained in a notorious Nazi camp in the city during World War II, which prompted the French Catholic priest to make his first trip to Rava-Ruska back in 2002.
