Poland’s president strips Zelenskyj of the country’s highest honor
Almost a week before a planned reconstruction conference for Ukraine in Gdansk, Poland, a Polish-Ukrainian historical dispute has escalated. Poland’s President Karol Nawrocki announced on Platform X that he had decided to withdraw the “Order of the White Eagle” from his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky.
Zelensky was awarded Poland’s highest honor in 2023 by Nawrocki’s predecessor Andrzej Duda to underline the friendship between Poland and Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression against Kiev. The current withdrawal is “not directed against the Ukrainian nation” and does not change the strategic direction of Polish security policy, Nawrocki asserted in a statement quoted by the PAP news agency.
Massacre of Poles and Jews
Zelensky sparked the dispute at the end of May when he gave an army unit the nickname “Hero of the UPA”. Kiev honors the memory of the underground fighters of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) because they resisted Soviet rule after World War II. During the war, the gunmen carried out massacres of tens of thousands of Poles and Jews in what is now western Ukraine. In Poland, Zelensky’s honoring of the UPA was met with outrage across party lines.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha announced that he would return a high state award that Poland gave him in 2022. Sybiha called the withdrawal of Zelensky’s medal on Facebook a strategic mistake by the Polish president from which only Moscow benefited. He spoke of unjustified and condescending steps by Polish politicians not only towards Zelensky, but towards the Ukrainian state.
The dispute overshadowed an important joint event planned in a week. A reconstruction conference for Ukraine is scheduled to take place in Gdansk on June 25th and 26th, involving the EU, the G7 and other donors. Poland and Ukraine are co-hosts.
