Western Ukraine

{{See also|General Government of Galicia and Bukovina}}

File:Coins 1382.png]]

Western Ukraine, takes its roots from the Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia, a successor of Kievan Rus' formed in 1199 after the weakening of Kievan Rus' and attacks from the Golden Horde.

Following the 14th century Galicia–Volhynia Wars, most of the region was transferred to the Crown of Poland under Casimir the Great, who received the lands legally by a downward agreement in 1340 after his nephew's death, Bolesław-Jerzy II. The eastern Volhynia and most of Podolia was added to the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania by Lubart.

The territory of Bukovina was part of Moldavia since its formation by voivode Dragoș, who was departed by the Kingdom of Hungary, during the 14th century.

After the 18th century partitions of Poland (Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth), the territory was split between the Habsburg monarchy and the Russian Empire. The modern south-western part of Western Ukraine became the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, after 1804 crownland of the Austrian Empire. Its northern flank with the cities of Lutsk and Rivne was acquired in 1795 by Imperial Russia following the third and final partition of Poland. Throughout its existence Russian Poland was marred with violence and intimidation, beginning with the 1794 massacres, imperial land-theft and the deportations of the November and January Uprisings.{{citation |author=Norman Davies |section-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9Tbed6iMNLEC&pg=PA60 |section=Part 2. Rossiya: The Russian Partition |publisher=Oxford University Press |title=God's Playground. A History of Poland |volume=II: 1795 to the Present |year=2005 |access-date=January 27, 2014 |pages=60–82 |isbn=0199253404 |author-link=Norman Davies |archive-date=February 11, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230211065116/https://books.google.com/books?id=9Tbed6iMNLEC&pg=PA60 |url-status=live }} By contrast, the Austrian Partition with its Sejm of the Land in the cities of Lviv and Stanyslaviv (Ivano-Frankivsk) was freer politically perhaps because it had a lot less to offer economically.{{citation |author=David Crowley |title=National Style and Nation-state: Design in Poland from the Vernacular Revival to the International Style |publisher=Manchester University Press ND, 1992 |isbn=0-7190-3727-1 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DHy7AAAAIAAJ&q=%22bieda+galicyjska%22&pg=PA12 |format=Google Print |page=12 |year=1992 |access-date=2020-11-21 |archive-date=2023-02-11 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230211065118/https://books.google.com/books?id=DHy7AAAAIAAJ&q=%22bieda+galicyjska%22&pg=PA12 |url-status=live }} Imperial Austria did not persecute Ukrainian organizations. In 1846, the Austrian government used the peasant uprising to decimate Polish nobles, who were organising an uprising against Austria.{{in lang|pl}} [http://encyklopedia.pwn.pl/haslo.php?id=3965088 rabacja galicyjska] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110607152642/http://encyklopedia.pwn.pl/haslo.php?id=3965088 |date=7 June 2011}} in Internetowa encyklopedia PWN In later years, Austria-Hungary de facto encouraged the existence of Ukrainian political organizations in order to counterbalance the influence of Polish culture in Galicia. The southern half of West Ukraine remained under Austrian administration until the collapse of the House of Habsburg at the end of World War One in 1918.

{{Details|topic=West Ukraine's sociopolitical background|Austrian Partition|Polish culture in the Interbellum}}

In 1775, following the Russo-Turkish Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca, Moldavia lost to the Habsburg monarchy its northwestern part, which became known as Bukovina, and remained under Austrian administration until 1918.

{{Details|Duchy of Bukovina}}

{{See also|West Ukrainian People's Republic|Soviet annexation of Eastern Galicia and Volhynia}}

Following the defeat of Ukrainian People's Republic (1918) in the Soviet–Ukrainian War of 1921, Western Ukraine was partitioned by the Treaty of Riga between Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and the Soviet Russia acting on behalf of the Soviet Belarus and the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic with capital in Kharkiv. The Soviet Union gained control over the entire territory of the short-lived Ukrainian People's Republic east of the border with Poland.[https://books.google.com/books?id=qmN95fFocsMC&dq=Ukrainian+State+Hetman+Pavlo&pg=PA849 Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States: 1999] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230211065125/https://books.google.com/books?id=qmN95fFocsMC&pg=PA849&dq=Ukrainian+State+Hetman+Pavlo&hl=nl&sa=X&ei=b5iaUbfCBefA0QWUloGYDQ&ved=0CFwQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q=Ukrainian%20State%20Hetman%20Pavlo&f=false |date=2023-02-11 }}, Routledge, 1999, {{ISBN|1857430581}} (page 849) In the Interbellum most of the territory of today's Western Ukraine belonged to the Second Polish Republic. Territories such as Bukovina and Carpatho-Ukraine belonged to Romania and Czechoslovakia, respectively.

{{See also|Soviet invasion of Poland|The Holocaust in Ukraine|Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia|Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina}}

At the onset of Operation Barbarossa by Nazi Germany, the region became occupied by Nazi Germany in 1941. The southern half of West Ukraine was incorporated into the semi-colonial Distrikt Galizien (District of Galicia) created on August 1, 1941 (Document No. 1997-PS of July 17, 1941 by Adolf Hitler) with headquarters in Chełm Lubelski, bordering district of General Government to the west. Its northern part (Volhynia) was assigned to the Reichskommissariat Ukraine formed in September 1941. Notably, the District of Galicia was a separate administrative unit from the actual Reichskommissariat Ukraine with capital in Rivne. They were not connected with each other politically for Nazi Germans.{{cite web |url=http://www.beirat-fuer-geschichte.de/fileadmin/pdf/band_19/Demokratische_Geschichte_Band_19_Essay_5.pdf |title=Hans-Adolf Asbach. Eine Nachkriegskarriere |publisher=Demokratische Geschichte |work=Band 19 Essay 5 |access-date=June 26, 2013 |author=Arne Bewersdorf |pages=1–42 |language=de |archive-date=April 3, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160403102516/http://www.beirat-fuer-geschichte.de/fileadmin/pdf/band_19/Demokratische_Geschichte_Band_19_Essay_5.pdf |url-status=live }} The division was administrative and conditional, in his book "From Putyvl to the Carpathian" Sydir Kovpak never mentioned about any border-like divisions. Bukovina was controlled by the Nazi-allied Kingdom of Romania.

{{See also|Polish population transfers (1944–1946)}}

After the defeat of Germany in World War II, in May 1945 the Soviet Union incorporated all territories of current Western Ukraine into the Ukrainian SSR. Between 1944 and 1946, a population exchange between Poland and Soviet Ukraine occurred in which all ethnic Poles and Jews who had Polish citizenship before September 17, 1939 (date of the Soviet Invasion of Poland) were transferred to post-war Poland and all ethnic Ukrainians to the Ukrainian SSR, in accordance with the resolutions of the Yalta and Tehran conferences and the plans about the new Poland–Ukraine border.{{Cite web |url=http://nashkraj.info/pereselenie-belorusov-iz-polshi-i-polesskaya-oblast-1944-1947-gg/ |title=Переселение белорусов из Польши и Полесская область (1944-1947 гг.) |website=Краязнаўчы сайт Гомеля і Гомельшчыны |date=30 November 2019 |access-date=2022-03-11 |archive-date=2021-09-01 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210901020443/http://nashkraj.info/pereselenie-belorusov-iz-polshi-i-polesskaya-oblast-1944-1947-gg/ |url-status=dead }}

{{see also|Russian invasion of Ukraine}}

During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russia attacked Ukrainian military facility near the city of Lviv,"[https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/3/13/russia-air-strikes-hit-ukraine-military-base-near-poland Russia strikes Ukraine army base near Poland as it widens attacks]". Al Jazeera. 14 March 2022. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220323115647/https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/3/13/russia-air-strikes-hit-ukraine-military-base-near-poland|date=2022-03-23}}. in Western Ukraine with cruise missiles. Later in March Russia performed missile attacks on oil depots in Lviv,{{cite web |url-status=live |title=The Lviv oil depot was completely destroyed by a Russian missile - the Regional State Administration |website=Ukrainska Pravda |date=27 March 2022 |url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/03/27/7334981/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220329135933/https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/03/27/7334981/|archive-date=2022-03-29 |first1=Roman |last1=Petrenko }} Dubno{{cite web |url-status=live |title=Rivne Administration: Oil depot in Dubno razed to the ground after missile strike |website= Ukrainska Pravda |date=March 27, 2022 |url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/03/27/7334939/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220329135428/https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/03/27/7334939/|archive-date=2022-03-29 |first1=Roman |last1=Petrenko }}{{cite web |url-status=live |title=Russian rocket hits an oil depot in the Rivne region |website=Ukrainska Pravda |date=March 28, 2022 |url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/03/28/7335332/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220329135934/https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/03/28/7335332/|archive-date=2022-03-29 |first1=Alona |last1=Mazurenko }} and Lutsk.{{cite web |url-status=live |title=Lutsk missile strike: Head of Volyn region shares details |website=Ukrainska Pravda |date=March 28, 2022 |url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/03/28/7335152/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220329135932/https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/03/28/7335152/|archive-date=2022-03-29 |first1=Iryna |last1=Balachuk }}

File:Map of West Ukrainian.jpg]]

File:Вид на горы с горы возле озера Синевир.JPG in the Zakarpattia Oblast are the highest mountain range in Ukraine]]

Western Ukraine includes such lands as Zakarpattia, Volyn, Halychyna (Prykarpattia, Pokuttia), Bukovina, Polissia, and Podillia.

The history of Western Ukraine is closely associated with the history of the following lands:

• Easternmost Bukovina, historical region of Central Europe in official use since 1775, controlled by the Kingdom of Romania after World War I, and half of it ceded to the USSR in 1940 (reconfirmed by Paris Peace Treaties, 1947)
• Eastern Galicia ({{langx|uk|Halychyna}}), once a small kingdom with Lodomeria (1914), province of the Austrian Empire until the dissolution of Austria-Hungary in 1918. See also: crownland of the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria
• Red Ruthenia since medieval times in the area known today as Eastern Galicia.
• West Ukrainian People's Republic declared in late 1918 until early 1919 and claiming half of Galicia with mostly Polish city dwellers (historical sense).
• Carpatho-Ukraine region within Czechoslovakia (1939) under Hungarian control until the Nazi occupation of Hungary in 1944.
• General Government of Galicia and Bukovina captured from Austria-Hungary during World War I.
• Ținutul Suceava (Kingdom of Romania)
• Volhynia, historic region straddling Poland, Ukraine, and Belarus to the north. The alternate name for the region today is Lodomeria after the city of Volodymyr. See also: Polish unofficial term Kresy (Borderlands, 1918–1939) that includes the West Belarus as well as Volhynia.
• Zakarpattia or Carpathian Ruthenia presently in the Zakarpattia Oblast of western Ukraine.

{{Quote box

| width = 40%

| align = right

| quote = "Perhaps, if Ukraine did not have its western regions, with Lviv at the centre, it would be easy to turn the country into another Belarus. But Galicia (Halychyna) and Bukovina, which became part of Soviet Ukraine under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, brought to the country a rebellious and free spirit."

| source = Andrey Kurkov in an opinion piece about Euromaidan on BBC News Online (28 January 2014)[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25927006 Viewpoint: Ukrainian writer Andrey Kurkov on the protests] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181011234312/https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25927006 |date=2018-10-11 }}, BBC News (28 January 2014)

}}

Ukrainian is the dominant language in the region. Back in the schools of the Ukrainian SSR learning Russian was mandatory; currently, in modern Ukraine, in schools with Ukrainian as the language of instruction, classes in Russian and in other minority languages are offered.Serhy Yekelchyk Ukraine: Birth of a Modern Nation, Oxford University Press (2007), {{ISBN|978-0-19-530546-3}}{{cite web |url-status=dead |url=http://norric.org/files/education-systems/Ukraine2009 |title=The Educational System of Ukraine |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200712194304/https://norric.org/files/education-systems/Ukraine2009 |archive-date=2020-07-12 |publisher=Nordic Recognition Network |date=April 2009}}

In terms of religion, the majority of adherents share the Byzantine Rite of Christianity as in the rest of Ukraine, but due to the region escaping the 1920s and 1930s Soviet persecution, a notably greater church adherence and belief in religion's role in society is present. Due to the complex post-independence religious confrontation of several church groups and their adherents, the historical influence played a key role in shaping the present loyalty of Western Ukraine's faithful. In Galician provinces, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church has the strongest following in the country, and the largest share of property and faithful. In the remaining regions: Volhynia, Bukovina and Transcarpathia the Orthodoxy is prevalent. Outside of Western Ukraine the greatest in terms of Church property, clergy, and according to some estimates, faithful, is the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate). In the listed regions (and in particular among the Orthodox faithful in Galicia), this position is notably weaker, as the main rivals, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church – Kyiv Patriarchate and the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church, have a far greater influence. Within the lands of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, the largest Eastern Catholic Church, priests' children often became priests and married within their social group, establishing a tightly-knit hereditary caste.{{cite book |last=Subtelny |first=Orest |date=2009 |title=Ukraine: a history |edition=4th |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ktyM07I9HXwC&pg=PT119 |location=Toronto [u.a.] |publisher=University of Toronto Press |pages=214–219 |isbn=978-1-4426-9728-7 |access-date=2021-01-11 |archive-date=2023-02-11 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230211065118/https://books.google.com/books?id=ktyM07I9HXwC&pg=PT119 |url-status=live }}

Noticeable cultural differences in the region (compared with the rest of Ukraine especially Southern Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine) are more "negative views"{{clarify|date=August 2017}} on the Russian language[http://ratinggroup.com.ua/en/products/politic/data/entry/14004/ The language question, the results of recent research in 2012] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150709203803/http://ratinggroup.com.ua/en/products/politic/data/entry/14004/ |date=2015-07-09 }}, RATING (25 May 2012){{Cite web |url=http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/poll-over-half-of-ukrainians-against-granting-official-status-to-russian-language-318212.html |title=Poll: Over half of Ukrainians against granting official status to Russian language - Dec. 27, 2012 |date=27 December 2012 |access-date=7 March 2013 |archive-date=8 September 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140908192629/https://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/poll-over-half-of-ukrainians-against-granting-official-status-to-russian-language-318212.html |url-status=live }} and on Joseph Stalin{{in lang|uk}} [http://kiis.com.ua/?lang=eng&cat=reports&id=140&page=1 Ставлення населення України до постаті Йосипа Сталіна Attitude population Ukraine to the figure of Joseph Stalin] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180917220552/http://kiis.com.ua/?lang=eng&cat=reports&id=140&page=1 |date=2018-09-17 }}, Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (1 March 2013) and more "positive views"{{clarify|date=August 2017}} on Ukrainian nationalism."[http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2010/sep/21/whos-afraid-ukrainian-history/ Who's Afraid of Ukrainian History?]" by Timothy D. Snyder, The New York Review of Books (21 September 2010). {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151024152853/http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2010/sep/21/whos-afraid-ukrainian-history/ |date=2015-10-24 }}. A higher percentage of voters in Western Ukraine supported Ukrainian independence in the 1991 Ukrainian independence referendum than in the rest of the country.[https://books.google.com/books?id=F_QMCypjpXwC&dq=six+candidates+in+favour+of+a+%22Yes%22+Ukrainian+independence&pg=PA128 Ukrainian Nationalism in the 1990s: A Minority Faith] by Andrew Wilson, Cambridge University Press, 1996, {{ISBN|0521574579}} (page 128). {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230211065119/https://books.google.nl/books?id=F_QMCypjpXwC&pg=PA128&dq=six+candidates+in+favour+of+a+%22Yes%22+Ukrainian+independence&hl=nl&sa=X&ei=vqUWUcP4K--q0AXbhIGADQ&ved=0CC4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=six%20candidates%20in%20favour%20of%20a%20%22Yes%22%20Ukrainian%20independence&f=false |date=2023-02-11 }}.{{ill|Ivan Katchanovski|uk|Качановський Іван Гнатович}}. (2009). [http://www.cpsa-acsp.ca/papers-2010/Katchanovski.pdf Terrorists or National Heroes? Politics of the OUN and the UPA in Ukraine] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170808171655/https://cpsa-acsp.ca/papers-2010/Katchanovski.pdf |date=2017-08-08 }} Paper prepared for presentation at the Annual Conference of the Canadian Political Science Association, Montreal, June 1–3, 2010

File:Ukraine KIIS-Regional-division2.png

In a poll conducted by Kyiv International Institute of Sociology in the first half of February 2014 0.7% of polled in West Ukraine believed "Ukraine and Russia must unite into a single state", nationwide this percentage was 12.5. The Russian-occupied parts of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions of Ukraine were not polled."[http://www.kiis.com.ua/?lang=eng&cat=reports&id=236&page=1 How relations between Ukraine and Russia should look like? Public opinion polls' results]", Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (4 March 2014). {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171223055352/http://www.kiis.com.ua/?lang=eng&cat=reports&id=236&page=1 |date=2017-12-23 }}.

During elections voters of Western oblasts (provinces) vote mostly for parties (Our Ukraine, Batkivshchyna)[http://www.cvk.gov.ua/pls/vnd2012/WP406?PT001F01=900&pf7171=52 Центральна виборча комісія України - WWW відображення ІАС "Вибори народних депутатів України 2012"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121016140034/http://www.cvk.gov.ua/pls/vnd2012/WP406?PT001F01=900&pf7171=52 |date=2012-10-16 }}
[http://en.for-ua.com/news/2012/08/30/111349.html CEC {{not a typo|substitues}} Tymoshenko, Lutsenko in voting papers] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140813233711/http://en.for-ua.com/news/2012/08/30/111349.html |date=2014-08-13 }} and presidential candidates (Viktor Yushchenko, Yulia Tymoshenko) with a pro-Western and state reform platform.[https://books.google.com/books?id=H23Pv4Ik3vMC&dq=Ukrainian++parties+pro-Western+Bloc&pg=PA396 Communist and Post-Communist Parties in Europe] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230211065118/https://books.google.com/books?id=H23Pv4Ik3vMC&pg=PA396&dq=Ukrainian++parties+pro-Western+Bloc&hl=nl&ei=8OdZTczRCMueOteptKIL&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CFMQ6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=Ukrainian%20%20parties%20pro-Western%20Bloc&f=false|date=2023-02-11}} by Uwe Backes and Patrick Moreau, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008, {{ISBN|978-3-525-36912-8}} (page 396)[http://www.opendemocracy.net/od-russia/andreas-umland/ukraine-right-wing-politics-is-genie-out-of-bottle Ukraine right-wing politics: is the genie out of the bottle?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171014083516/http://www.opendemocracy.net/od-russia/andreas-umland/ukraine-right-wing-politics-is-genie-out-of-bottle |date=2017-10-14 }}, openDemocracy.net (3 January 2011){{cite web |url-status=dead |url=http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=39981 |title=Eight Reasons Why Ukraine's Party of Regions Will Win the 2012 Elections |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160328012351/http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews[tt_news]=39981 |archive-date=2016-03-28 |first1=Taras |last1=Kuzio |author-link1=Taras Kuzio |website=The Jamestown Foundation |date=17 October 2012}}
{{cite web |url-status=dead |url=http://www.taraskuzio.net/media20_files/8.pdf |title=UKRAINE: Yushchenko needs Tymoshenko as ally again |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130515074305/http://www.taraskuzio.net/media20_files/8.pdf |archive-date=2013-05-15 |author-link1=Taras Kuzio |first1=Taras |last1=Kuzio |publisher=Oxford Analytica |date=5 October 2007 }} Of the regions of Western Ukraine, Galicia tends to be the most pro-Western and pro-nationalist area. Volhynia's politics are similar, though not as nationalist or as pro-Western as Galicia's. Bukovina-Chernvisti's electoral politics are more mixed and tempered by the region's significant Romanian minority. Finally, Zakarpattia's electoral politics tend to be more competitive, similar to a Central Ukrainian oblast. This is due to the region's distinct historical and cultural identity as well as the significant Hungarian and Romanian minorities. The politics in the region was dominated by such Ukrainian parties as Andriy Baloha's Team, Social Democratic Party of Ukraine (united), Congress of Carpathian Ruthenians led by the Rusyn Orthodox Church bishop Dimitry Sydor and KMKSZ – Hungarian Party in Ukraine.

{{Pie chart

|thumb = left

|caption = Religion in western Ukraine (2016)[http://old.razumkov.org.ua/upload/Religiya_200516_A4.compressed.pdf РЕЛІГІЯ, ЦЕРКВА, СУСПІЛЬСТВО І ДЕРЖАВА: ДВА РОКИ ПІСЛЯ МАЙДАНУ (Religion, Church, Society and State: Two Years after Maidan)] {{Webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170422181327/http://old.razumkov.org.ua/upload/Religiya_200516_A4.compressed.pdf |date=2017-04-22 }}, 2016 report by Razumkov Center in collaboration with the All-Ukrainian Council of Churches. pp. 27-29.

|label1 = Eastern Orthodoxy

|value1 = 57.0

|color1 = Orchid

|label2 = Greek Catholicism

|value2 = 30.9

|color2 = DarkOrchid

|label3 = Unspecified Christianity

|value3 = 4.3

|color3 = Turquoise

|label4 = Protestantism

|value4 = 3.9

|color4 = DodgerBlue

|label5 = Roman Catholicism

|value5 = 1.6

|color5 = Indigo

|label6 = Judaism

|value6 = 0.2

|color6 = Blue

|label7 = Non-believers

|value7 = 2.1

|color7 = Honeydew

}}

File:Ukraine census 2001 Ukrainians.svg

According to a 2016 survey of religion in Ukraine held by the Razumkov Center, approximately 93% of the population of western Ukraine declared to be believers, while 0.9% declared to non-believers, and 0.2% declared to atheists.

Of the total population, 97.7% declared to be Christians (57.0% Eastern Orthodox, 30.9% members of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, 4.3% simply Christians, 3.9% members of various Protestant churches, and 1.6% Latin Church Catholics), by far more than in all other regions of Ukraine, while 0.2% were Jews. Non-believers and other believers not identifying with any of the listed major religious institutions constituted about 2.1% of the population.

{{clear}}

Prior to World War II the areas of current Lviv Oblast, Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast, Ternopil Oblast, Volyn Oblast and Rivne Oblast were parts of Polish voivodeships of Lwów, Stanisławów, Tarnopol and Wołyń (Volhynia). This area was ethnically very mixed. Table below shows the linguistic (mother tongue) and religious structure of interwar South-East Poland (now part of Western Ukraine) by county, according to the 1931 census:

• Dnieper Ukraine
• Western Belarus
• Wild Fields

{{Reflist|group=Note}}

{{reflist|2}}

• {{wikivoyage-inline|Western Ukraine}}
• {{Commonscatinline}}

{{Ukrainian historical regions}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:Geographic regions of Ukraine

Category:Carpathian Ruthenia