Nawrocki-linked remarks on western Ukraine spark political backlash
Polish President Karol Nawrocki (Photo: Getty Images)
The Chancellery of the President of Poland used the term "Eastern Lesser Poland" (Małopolska Wschodnia) in reference to western Ukraine and criticized the Verkhovna Rada's decision to create a Ukrainian National Pantheon. Naturally, Stepan Bandera and the UPA were mentioned, according to PAP.
The corresponding chauvinistic statement was made by the Head of the Chancellery of the President of Poland, Zbigniew Bogucki, during a speech in the Sejm. The Polish official called the decision to create the pantheon a mistaken one.
Bogucki links this step to the glorification of figures whom Warsaw considers responsible for the tragic events of the past. This refers to Stepan Bandera and the Volhynia tragedy.
"This is the legislation of the Ukrainian state, which has the sovereign right to make its own decisions. The only question is whether they are correct. In my opinion, and above all in the opinion of President Karol Nawrocki, as well as, I believe, the vast majority of Poles, glorifying Bandera and the criminals who committed acts of genocide in Volhynia and Eastern Lesser Poland – this is not the path to the Western world, to shared European and transatlantic values."
The official added another sharp point:
"And Poland and the President will never agree to this – because, as he said, 'we do not abandon our own.' The voice of the victims is still heard, and the voice of the Bandera supporters cannot drown it out."
Historical context of the nonsense from Nawrocki's Chancellery
Statements about returning Lviv and Eastern Lesser Poland are nothing more than the imperial itch of a country partitioned by three (and, in fact, five) other states. Poland had ceased to exist altogether for at least 123 years.
But historically, the original lands of Western Ukraine were never Polish.
Here is the fact about Lviv:
1256 – the first chronicle mention of Lviv, which was founded by King Danylo Romanovych (of Galicia). The city was the capital of the Kingdom of Rus, and Danylo himself was its king. He belonged to the main dynasty of Kyivan princes.
1340–1349 – after the extinction of the Romanovych dynasty, the Polish King Casimir III the Great conducted a series of military campaigns and occupied Galicia.
Even after the conquest, the Poles officially named this territory the Rus' Voivodeship (Województwo Ruskie), with its center in Lviv. There was no Lesser Poland here – the Polish crown legally recognized that this was the land of Rus.
The artificial chauvinistic term Eastern Lesser Poland (Małopolska Wschodnia) is relatively modern. It was artificially imposed by the government of the Second Polish Republic between 1918 and 1939.
The term was used to integrate Ukrainian lands into a unitary Poland. The Polish authorities at the time officially banned the names Western Ukraine and Eastern Galicia. The name was intended to completely displace Ukrainian national identity from these territories.
Polish authorities classified the current Lviv, Ternopil, and Ivano-Frankivsk regions as Eastern Lesser Poland. At the time, these were the Lviv, Ternopil, and Stanyslaviv voivodeships.
The use of this term in Ukraine today is perceived as an encroachment on historical justice and territorial integrity.
Context of the event
Such statements are being made ahead of the upcoming Polish elections, against the backdrop of the conflict over Volodymyr Zelenskyy signing a decree assigning one of the units the name "named after the Heroes of the UPA."
After this, Polish President Karol Nawrocki stripped Zelenskyy of the Order of the White Eagle, and mutual rejection of awards by the Ukrainian and Polish sides began.
Nawrocki's Chancellery already views the creation of the Pantheon of Ukrainian Heroes as an action of an escalatory nature.
