Poland PM to remind Ukraine that glorifying Bandera unacceptable
Poland's premier underlines that he would address Ukraine's public support of Ukrainian Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera.
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Activists of various extreme right-wing parties carry torches and a portrait of Stepan Bandera during a rally in Kyiv, Ukraine, Saturday, Jan. 1, 2022 (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)
Warsaw will remind Ukraine that glorifying Ukrainian nationalist Stepan Bandera is not acceptable, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said Monday.
Morawiecki said he would tell his Ukrainian counterpart, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal, that it was inadmissible to glorify the controversial far-right Ukrainian figure at the soonest meeting they have.
This comes a day after Verkhovna Rada, the Ukrainian parliament, published information about Bandera's birthday on its official Twitter page.
When asked to comment on this situation, Morawiecki said Warsaw was highly critical of any praise or even mention of Bandera and views it negatively.
"During my first conversation with Shmyhal, I will relay this very, very clearly," Morawiecki told reporters. "The Verkhovna Rada recalls the person who was the ideologist of criminal times."
The tweet has since been deleted.
Ukrainian parliament Twitter page deletes its tweet & photo of Commander-in-Chief of Armed Forces of #Ukraine propagating terrorist & Nazi collaborator #Bandera. Bandera OUN & UPA collaborated with Nazis & perpetrated mass murder of Jews, Poles & #Ukrainians during World War II. pic.twitter.com/LfUfb9jPIF
— Ivan Katchanovski (@I_Katchanovski) January 2, 2023
Bandera was a Ukrainian nationalist leader who collaborated with Nazi Germany during World War II and was responsible for mass atrocities against civilians as a leader of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.
The UPA operated mainly in western Ukraine and fought against Soviet forces in cooperation with Nazi Germany. The UPA had many crimes to their credit, including the Volhynia massacre, a mass slaughter of the Polish population residing in Volhynia and Galicia in 1943.
Polish historians consider the massacres as genocide and ethnic cleansing, which claimed the lives of up to 130,000 people.
In the 1930s, Bandera joined the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists, a union between radical nationalists and extreme right-wing organizations, including the Union of Ukrainian Fascists.
The OUN initiated a campaign of terror in Poland, which included the assassination of prominent Polish politicians, such as interior Minister Bronislaw Pieracki, as well as Polish and Ukrainian moderates, such as Tadeusz Holowko.
