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Ukraine will keep issuing Polish exhumation permits despite historical tensions. Dispute “causes joy in Moscow,” Kyiv says

✇Euromaidan Press
By: Olena Mukhina

The monument to murdered Polish civilians in Huta Peniatska in Ukraine's Lviv Oblast was restored in 2017. Photo: NV

Ukraine remains ready to continue issuing permits for Polish exhumation work despite intensifying historical disputes between Ukraine and Poland, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Heorhii Tykhyi says, per Ukrinform. Exhumation work at the site of the Huta Pieniacka continues. 

The spokesperson added that the intensifying tension between Ukraine and Poland causes "joy in Moscow." He called on allies to seek grounds for unity against the common enemy that "wants to destroy both Ukraine and Poland." 

The current Polish-Ukrainian historical dispute centers on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's 27 May decision to confer the honorary title "named after UPA Heroes" on the Separate Center of Special Operations "Pivnich" of Ukraine's Special Operations Forces. The Polish Foreign Ministry condemned the decision.

The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) is a deeply contested figure in Polish-Ukrainian historical memory. Ukrainian historiography presents UPA as anti-Soviet and anti-Nazi independence fighters. Polish historiography emphasizes UPA's association with the 1943-44 Volhynia massacres.

Zelenskyy UPA-naming decision and Polish reaction

Tykhyi also stated that the honoring of UPA heroes had no anti-Polish subtext. He noted that the history of the Polish and Ukrainian peoples contains both glorious and tragic pages.

The diplomat added that preparations for the Ukraine Recovery Conference (URC 2026), scheduled for June 25–26 in Gdańsk, are proceeding as planned and in a regular working mode.

“We hope that the conference will be held successfully,” Tykhyi emphasized.

Historical memory disputes spill into modern cooperation

The Vinnytsia-Kielce bus dispute earlier this week is the latest concrete example of how historical memory tensions have affected practical Polish-Ukrainian cooperation, Euromaidan Press reported. Polish sister-city Kielce refused to transfer 20-year-old municipal buses to Vinnytsia, a Ukrainian city under regular Russian strikes, over a street named after Bandera.

Stepan Bandera, the Ukrainian nationalist leader, led the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and the UPA.  

Russia actively uses its propaganda, referring to Ukrainians as “Banderites” and portraying Ukrainian statehood as a continuation of Nazism. 

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When Balance Becomes Paralysis: Poland and the Structural Limits of the Post-1989 Order

✇New Eastern Outlook
By: Adrian Korczyński
On 3 May 2026, Polish President Karol Nawrocki announced the creation of a Council for a New Constitution. The initiative, framed as a response to chronic institutional deadlock, has opened a debate that reaches far beyond technical constitutional reform. It touches the core question quietly confronting much of Central and Eastern Europe: whether governance architectures […]
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Trump’s Retaliatory Withdrawal: America Punishes Europe for Refusing to Join Its War with Iran

✇New Eastern Outlook
By: Adrian Korczyński
In the first days of May 2026, the Pentagon announced the withdrawal of approximately 5,000 American troops from Germany over the next six to twelve months — with explicit threats of further cuts directed at Italy and Spain. President Donald Trump stated the reason with characteristic bluntness: these countries had failed to provide meaningful support […]
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