This last week’s pattern by Kiev and London, of ‘normalizing’ and/or celebrating Ukraine’s Nazi collaborators and modern neo-Nazis, was greeted with silent consent by the EU and Europe’s ‘permanent war’ faction—now with two modest exceptions. The May 25 repatriation and celebration in Kiev of Hitler’s main Ukrainian collaborator, OUN head Andriy Melnyk, raised a note of protest, as Israel’s Foreign Ministry managed to post on X that there is “no place for ignoring historical truth and the memory of the victims murdered by the Nazis and their collaborators.”
Then Zelensky’s honoring, the next day, of the WWII Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), viewed by Poland as responsible for the ‘Volhynia Massacre’ of Polish civilians, has now drawn a reaction from Poland’s President Karol Nawrocki. So far, the ‘softball’ interview by London’s Reuters of the infamous neo-Nazi Andriy Biletsky, published on Day 3, not raised an eyebrow.
On May 29, Nawrocki told journalists: “By naming the Ukrainian unit after the ‘Heroes of the UPA', the President of Ukraine provided the best material and a lot of oxygen to Russian propaganda. I evaluate this decision very critically.” For this, Nawrocki has proposed that Zelensky be stripped of the Order of the White Eagle, awarded to Zelensky in 2023 by President Andrzej Duda. He added that Zelensky’s action is also “proof that those who said that Ukraine should enter the European Union without any expectations were very wrong... President Zelensky has proven that Ukraine is not ready to be part of the European family in terms of mentality, glorification of bandits, murderers from the UPA.”
The Kyiv Post explained: “Under Polish law, a state decoration may be revoked if the recipient is found to have committed acts rendering them unworthy of the honor.” And under Article 144 of Poland’s Constitution, the countersignature of the prime minister is required. Hence, PM Donald Tusk, he of ‘permanent warfare’ loyalties, may find himself having to choose whether his continued support for ‘permanent warfare’ against Russia is worth endorsing the massacre of Poles.
The UPA, subordinate to Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera’s OUN-B, was responsible, among other things, for the extermination of the Polish population in Volhynia. In July 1943, the UPA carried out a coordinated attack on about 150 towns inhabited by Poles in districts now in present-day Ukraine.
