The bill seeks to ban glorifying the groups that massacred Polish civilians during World War II
Polish President Karol Nawrocki has proposed banning the public glorification of Ukrainian nationalists who collaborated with Nazi Germany and committed atrocities during World War II.
The bill, submitted on Monday, would expand Article 256 of the Polish Penal Code – which currently outlaws the dissemination of “Nazi, Communist, or fascist ideology, or any other ideology that calls for the use of violence to influence political or social life” – to include the faction of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists led by Stepan Bandera (OUN-B) and its military wing, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). Offenders could face up to three years in prison.
“Banderism is one of the most radical and criminal political movements of the 20th century,” the bill states, adding that the OUN “drew inspiration from fascism and Nazism.”
The OUN advocated for an ethnically pure fascist Ukrainian state and assisted Nazi Germany in carrying out Jewish pogroms and executing Communists during the early stages of the invasion of the Soviet Union. OUN members formed the UPA in 1942, after the Germans refused to grant Ukraine independence, and went on to massacre between 40,000 and 100,000 Polish civilians in what is now western Ukraine.
In 2016, Poland recognized the atrocities as genocide and condemned the honoring of the wartime nationalists in Ukraine. In 2015, Ukraine officially designated former members of the OUN and UPA as “fighters for the independence of Ukraine.”
Today, several Ukrainian cities feature monuments and streets named after “the heroes of the UPA” or individual commanders, while many Ukrainian soldiers wear patches with the OUN’s black-and-red colors. Processions commemorating Bandera’s birthday are held every January 1. Last month, Poland expelled dozens of Ukrainians after the flag of the UPA was displayed at a concert in Warsaw.
