KIEV, March 24. /TASS/. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko on Tuesday signed a decree on declaring May 8 the national holiday, the Remembrance and Reconciliation Day.
The presidential decree says that on May 8 and May 9 events will be held marking the 70th anniversary of Victory over Nazism in Europe, the Remembrance and Reconciliation Day and the Victory Day.
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On Monday, a group of Ukrainian lawmakers submitted to the parliament a draft law on Remembrance and Reconciliation Day. They called to declare May 8 a holiday instead of May 9.
The Ukrainian MPs said the initiative comes as Europe remembers the victims of World War II on May 8.
Leonid Slutsky, who chairs Russia's State Duma’s committee on the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) affairs, said on Tuesday Kiev’s proposals not to mark the Victory Day in Ukraine on May 9 point to "the side effect of the European integration and historical amnesia."
Kiev is "acting like the puppet of the West" while forgetting about its own history and spitting in the face of those who lost their lives when fighting against fascism, the lawmaker said.