Polish President Karol Nawrocki withdrew Poland's highest state honour — the Order of the White Eagle — from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Saturday after Kyiv named an army unit after a Ukrainian nationalist paramilitary group accused of massacring Polish civilians during World War II. The decision threatens to unleash a serious diplomatic crisis between the two neighbours just days before a major conference on Ukraine's reconstruction in the Polish city of Gdańsk, per France 24. Zelenskyy returned the honour after the revocation, per PBS NewsHour.
What's the WWII Volyn context? The Volyn massacre — in which Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) units killed tens of thousands of ethnic Poles in 1943-44 — remains the most politically loaded historical-memory dispute between Poland and Ukraine, per PBS NewsHour's framing.
Why now? Nawrocki's decision is likely to spark a severe diplomatic crisis, per Deutsche Welle. The presidential office has not specified what prompted the timing — but the move places maximum pressure on Kyiv ahead of the Gdańsk summit.
What's the Gdańsk summit? A major Ukraine reconstruction conference is due in Gdańsk in coming days. Reconstruction-summit Polish hosting was supposed to anchor Poland-Ukraine cooperation on post-war rebuilding.
How did Zelenskyy respond? Zelenskyy returned the Order of the White Eagle to Poland after the revocation. The return-the-honour response refuses to keep an honour the issuer has revoked — formalising the rupture.
What's the EU-side risk? The Poland-Ukraine relationship has been a central pillar of EU support for Ukraine in the Russia war. A rupture between Kyiv and Warsaw raises the risk that EU-coordinated Ukraine support enters a more fractured phase — particularly on reconstruction funding.
What's the next data point? The Gdańsk summit becomes the immediate test of whether the rupture is contained at the heads-of-state symbolic level or whether it cascades into working-level reconstruction-funding architecture.
Figures referenced: none. — JudgeMarket.
