Foreign Minister Andriy Szybiga said that he would return a high state award to Poland after Polish President Karol Nawrocki decided to deprive the President of Ukraine of the Order of the White Eagle.
Points of attention
- Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga announced his intention to return a high state award to Poland in response to the scandalous decision by Polish President Karol Nawrocki to deprive the President of Ukraine of the Order of the White Eagle.
- Tensions between Ukraine and Poland have heightened following the removal of the Order of the White Eagle, with Szybiga calling Nawrocki's move a strategic mistake that could benefit Moscow.
Sybiga reacted to Navrotsky's scandalous decision
The minister announced this on Facebook.
Sibiga called Navrotsky's move a strategic mistake from which only Moscow would benefit.
We regret that emotions have prevailed in Warsaw and forced Polish politicians to take unjustified, impulsive and contemptuous steps not even towards President Zelensky, but primarily towards the Ukrainian state. Against the background of such reckless actions, I see no way to keep the high state award of the Republic of Poland, awarded to me in October 2022 — the Commander's Cross with the Star of the Order "For Merit to Poland". I will soon return it to Poland.
Andriy Sybiga
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine
He stated that it was not about orders, but about attitude, and Ukraine had always advocated an approach of mutual respect — even when it came to complex and problematic topics.
And this implies that we respect each other's decisions even when we disagree with them. "We agree to disagree," as they say. We never wanted this conflict. Instead, for a year and a half, we actively worked on resolving disputes, depoliticizing historical issues, unblocking professional, scientific work, search and exhumation work and reburials at the request of the Polish side, and resuming the activities of the Congress of Historians. We have achieved a lot on this path. It's just that search work in Guta-Peniatska, which the Poles requested, is currently underway.
Against the backdrop of all this, the current escalation is counterproductive and unnecessary for neither Ukrainians nor Poles, he added.
We regret that instead of seeking solutions, the Polish side has decided to escalate this escalation to an unacceptable and inadequate level. No president of another country will dictate our history to us.
He expressed the hope that later, cold reason would prevail and Polish friends would return to an equal dialogue, which is consistent with allied relations between the countries against the backdrop of countering a common enemy in Moscow.
On June 19, Polish President Karol Nawrocki decided to strip Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of the Order of the White Eagle due to the awarding of the title "heroes of the UPA" to one of the units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
