Born in a family of soldier of
Red Army in
Novohrad-Volynskyi, where his father served. He went to
war in August 1941 at his own request. He was taken into 38th Separate Communication Battalion to the position of motorcycle
machine gunner. During the retreat at
Uman he received shrapnel wounds to the head, after which he was transferred to the city
Akbulak of
Orenburg Oblast. After recovering in December 1941 he aimed at
Kalinin Front to the
908th Rifle Regiment of
256th Rifle Division of
29th Army in the city
Rzhev, where he was selected in the regimental reconnaissance platoon, in which he fought until December 1942 when he was seriously injured in the left leg while performing special tasks. He fought at
Stalingrad as squad commander. From March 1943 to February 1944, he studied in the 1st Leningrad Artillery School (), which at that time was located in
Engels. He graduated with honors, with specialization in artillery reconnaissance and received the rank of lieutenant. After graduation, Steklyar was appointed commander of the reconnaissance platoon of
211th Artillery Regiment of
61st Army of
1st Belorussian Front. As part of the
61st Army he participated in the liberation of
Belarus. Then he was sent to the
2nd Baltic Front, where he participated in the liberation of
Riga, for which he was awarded the
Order of the Great Patriotic War, Second Class. In November 1944 he was sent to Poland. For the liberation of Warsaw Steklyar was awarded the
Order of the Great Patriotic War, First Class. He met victory in Germany (in
Wittenberg). In May 1945 he was appointed company commander of
SMERSH in
Berlin. Therefore, the
Soviet state security decided to "stop his anti-Soviet activities". Steklyar participated in the final part of the operation. On 25 August 2016, the Administrative Court in Rivne District held a hearing in case Boris Steklyar against the Office of the SBU in Rivne region, which, contrary to the Law of Ukraine "On access to archives of repressive totalitarian communist regime in [the] 1917-1991 years," asked the court to compel the Office SBU Rivne region not to provide his personal file No.2095 for review. The claim was left without consideration. Later analysis of the personal file and archive documents revealed that KGB colonel Boris Steklyar who participated in the liquidation of the underground artist of UPA Nil Khasevych in 1960 performing operational duties against Ukrainian nationalists in
Soviet concentration camps. There is about the order of the Chairman of the KGB lieutenant general Vitaliy Nikitchenko No.85 dated 17 July 1964 to encourage the Office of the KGB in Rivnenskoiy area. Among the award for
skillfully prepared measures to debunk the ideology of Ukrainian bourgeois nationalists and show the achievements of the Ukrainian SSR during the Soviet period spent in Dubravny corrective labor camp Mordovia ASSR is also the name of Boris Steklyar. In this camp served terms of imprisonment famous Ukrainian dissidents and former rebels Svyatoslav Karavansky,
Ivan Gel,
Vyacheslav Chornovil, Vasyl Levkovych,
Yuriy Badzyo, Michaylo Soroka (died in camp),
Josyf Slipyj and others. As historian of Liberation Movement Research Center, the former deputy director of the SBU archive Vladimir Birchak stated, "measures", in which Steklyar participated in the camps likely have been something more serious than "showing the achievements of the USSR". Steklyar died on 18 January 2018. == Honours and awards ==