Polish president strips Zelensky of top honour over UPA military unit row
Polish President Karol Nawrocki announced on Friday that he would strip Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of the Order of the White Eagle, accusing Kyiv of glorifying the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, known as the UPA.
Nawrocki condemned Ukraine's decision to name a military unit after the UPA, describing the move as "outrageous" and damaging to reconciliation efforts between the two countries.
"The decision of the Ukrainian authorities to glorify the UPA is not only outrageous, it is also incomprehensible and deeply disappointing," Nawrocki said. "It strikes at the foundation of reconciliation. It strikes at the conviction that truth can be the common language of our nations."
The Polish president stressed that his decision was not directed against the Ukrainian people and did not alter Warsaw's strategic support for Kyiv.
"Poland remains ready to cooperate with Ukraine," he said. "But Poland will consistently guard the memory of its citizens and the dignity of its own state symbols...Poland will not agree to the glorification of those who murdered defenseless Polish civilians."
"Ukraine's path to European structures also requires a readiness to honestly face the difficult pages of its own history. For those who do not understand this, there can be no place in the European Union, and Poland will certainly not allow that," he added.
He warned that there were "limits that must not be crossed" in Polish-Ukrainian relations and urged Kyiv to return to what he called a path of truth and mutual respect.
Zelensky was awarded the Order of the White Eagle in 2023 by then-president Andrzej Duda. He had not commented on Nawrocki's decision at the time of publication.
The UPA was a nationalist armed group active during and after World War II. Poland holds UPA units responsible for massacres of Polish civilians in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia. In 2016, the Polish parliament recognised the killings as genocide and designated July 11 as a national day of remembrance for the victims.
This story is written and edited by the Global South World team, you can contact us here.
