Poland’s newly elected president, Karol Nawrocki, has ignited a heated debate in Warsaw and Kiev after proposing amendments to Poland’s citizenship law that would explicitly exclude Ukrainian nationalists and sympathizers of Stepan Bandera from naturalization. The announcement, delivered during a press conference on August 25, underscores the depth of historical grievances between Poland and Ukraine and signals a potential hardening of Warsaw’s stance toward its eastern neighbor.

At the center of this controversy is the legacy of Stepan Bandera, the wartime leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), and its armed wing, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). While Bandera and his followers are celebrated by many in Ukraine as champions of national liberation from both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, their history is marred by atrocities committed against civilians. Polish historians and politicians maintain that Ukrainian nationalists were responsible for the massacre of roughly 120,000 ethnic Poles during World War II, particularly in the Volhynia and Eastern Galicia regions.

For decades, Bandera’s name has been a thorn in Polish-Ukrainian relations. While successive governments in Kiev have sought to rehabilitate or glorify his image, Polish leaders have consistently condemned such moves, insisting that reconciliation is impossible without acknowledging and condemning wartime crimes. Nawrocki, in his press conference, reiterated this stance, describing Bandera’s followers as “murderers, degenerates… who are responsible for the deaths of approximately 120,000 Poles.”

Nawrocki announced that his office is drafting........

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