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By Marni Rose McFall
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Poland has moved to strip Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of the country's highest honor after he approved the renaming of a Ukrainian military unit to commemorate the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), a nationalist force responsible for massacres of tens of thousands of Poles during World War II.
The fallout could also play into the hands of Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has long sought to portray Zelensky and Ukraine as Nazis. Ukraine's Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha called the decision from Polish President Karol Nawrocki “a strategic mistake" that "only Moscow benefits" from.
It also risks igniting a broader diplomatic clash between the neighboring countries, which have been closely aligned since the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and comes only days ahead of a conference on the reconstruction of Ukraine in Poland.
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The World War II Dispute Between Ukraine and Poland Explained
Warsaw has been a strong supporter of Kyiv, and the two countries have been united against Moscow as a common enemy.
But through the years of conflict, sentiment toward Ukraine has shifted in response to a number of issues, including refugees and grain imports. The legacy of the World War II massacres is another factor influencing how Poland relates to Ukraine.
Nawrocki said in a statement, “In light of President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's consent to name one of the units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine 'Heroes of the UPA,'... I have decided to revoke the Order of the White Eagle from the President of Ukraine.”
"At this point, I would like to emphasize: this decision is not directed against the Ukrainian people. It does not signify a change in the strategic direction of Polish security policy," he said.
In response, Sybiha wrote on Facebook, "We regret that instead of looking for solutions, the Polish side decided to escalate this conflict to an unacceptable and inappropriate level… No president of another country is going to dictate our history to us."
The UPA's Troubled History
The UPA are regarded as heroes by some in Ukraine for the resistance they mounted against Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, and for some, symbolize Kyiv’s struggle for independence from Moscow.
However, the UPA was involved in the Volhynia massacre, a series of killings from 1943 to 1945. Polish historians and officials estimate that around 100,000 Polish civilians were killed by the UPA and associated nationalist forces.
Kyiv's decision to honor a Ukrainian special forces unit by naming it after the UPA sparked outrage across Poland's political spectrum.
A survey from SW Research in Poland earlier this month found that 51.9 percent of those polled said that their view of Ukraine and Zelensky had worsened after this decision.
The Order of the White Eagle was awarded to Zelensky in 2023 by former president Andrzej Duda for his contributions to bilateral relations, democracy, peace and security in Europe.
Vladimir Putin Has Long Sought to Portray Zelensky and Ukraine as Nazis
Since Russia began it’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Putin has sought to portray Zelensky and Ukraine as Nazis, and evoke the holocaust in communications about the war.
In a TV address on February 24, the day Russia invaded Ukraine, Putin said that the goal of the invasion of Ukraine was to “protect the people that are subjected to abuse, genocide from the Kyiv regime” and to “demilitarize and denazify Ukraine.” He also claimed that Ukraine was led by “far-right nationalists and neo-Nazis.”
Putin’s rhetoric draws on the Soviet mythologization of the Great Patriotic War and reframes Nazism as an attack on Soviet identity.
A study from the research organization RAND, published in 2025, found that Russia has spread extremist narratives online, including the “Nazi Ukraine trope,” and said that these narratives circulate significantly in Russian-language online spaces.
Though Ukraine does have a history of antisemitism and some modern far-right groups, they are politically marginal.
The fallout could risk playing into the narrative that Putin has moved to establish about Ukraine, as the public dispute risks reinforcing one of Moscow's central messaging themes at a time when Ukraine continues to rely on Western political support.
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