Volodymyr Zelensky names a regiment after an organization accused of massacring Poles during World War II, Warsaw "indignant"

A decision which “hurt” the Poles. The Polish authorities condemned on Friday May 29 the decision of Volodymyr Zelensky, who named a military unit “Hero of the UPA”, after the name of a nationalist organization from the Second World War, accused by Warsaw of the deaths of more than 100,000 Poles. The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) was the military wing of a Ukrainian independence movement that challenged Soviet domination, notably by collaborating with the Nazis.

“Indigné”Polish nationalist President Karol Nawrocki proposed depriving his Ukrainian counterpart of the most important Polish distinction, the Order of the White Eagle. Pro-European Prime Minister Donald Tusk condemned Volodymyr Zelensky’s decision, calling it“disturbingly”. That “hurts our historical sensitivity”, declared the head of the Polish government. He said he was waiting “from the two presidents that they manage to rise above this History and that they try to build Polish-Ukrainian cooperation, difficult but necessary.”

Poland, Ukraine’s very close ally since the start of the Russian invasion, continues to demand that kyiv recognize responsibility for the massacres in Volhynia, perpetrated on Poles by Ukrainian nationalists between 1943 and 1945. While fighting the Russian invasion, the Ukrainian government has on its side launched a project aimed at creating a pantheon of the country’s heroes to unite Ukrainians around historical figures of the independence movement, at the risk of obscuring the dark pages of this heritage.

In this context, kyiv also repatriated and reburied the head of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists this week. Members of this organization fought in SS formations and took part in the deportation and massacre of Jews and thousands of Polish civilians in Volhynia (now northwest Ukraine) during World War II.