Poland Defends Revoking Zelensky's 2023 Award as UPA Naming Deepens Diplomatic Row
Updated
Updated · Kyiv Independent · Jun 22
Poland Defends Revoking Zelensky's 2023 Award as UPA Naming Deepens Diplomatic Row
3 articles · Updated · Kyiv Independent · Jun 22
Summary
A top aide to President Karol Nawrocki said Poland stripped Volodymyr Zelensky of the Order of the White Eagle because naming a unit after the UPA insulted Poles, not because Warsaw is ending support for Ukraine.
Agnieszka Jedrzak said Poland does not revoke the award posthumously from figures such as Benito Mussolini or Catherine II, and argued former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder had never insulted the Polish nation as directly as Zelensky did.
The clash escalated after Nawrocki revoked the honor on June 19 and Zelensky returned the medal by courier on June 20, a move Jedrzak called "adding insult to injury."
Zelensky tied the dispute to Polish domestic politics and warned relations could harden, while Nawrocki rejected that claim and said the fight is over Polish memory of UPA crimes in Volyn, where tens of thousands of Polish civilians were killed.
The row is unfolding a year before Poland's parliamentary election, with Prime Minister Donald Tusk calling the feud a strategic mistake and urging de-escalation.