Kaczyński Calls for Blocking Ukraine's EU Accession Unless It Changes Course
Polish opposition leader Jarosław Kaczyński has urged his party members to block Ukraine's EU accession until Kyiv abandons its policy of glorifying Stepan Bandera and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA).
Jarosław Kaczyński, leader of the Polish opposition party Law and Justice (PiS), has sent a letter to party members calling for all available means to block Ukraine's accession to the European Union. He argues that Ukraine cannot be admitted to the EU unless it completely abandons its current course, which he claims involves "the cult of Bandera and other criminals, the glorification of the UPA and OUN." Kaczyński described this ideology as one of the most criminal and inhuman, shaping the consciousness of the Ukrainian nation today.
In the letter, Kaczyński urges party members to block the efforts of Prime Minister Donald Tusk's government aimed at integrating Ukraine into the EU on privileged terms. He stated that no sovereign state can tolerate genocidal actions against its own people, even to the slightest degree. The politician also claimed that Poland and its citizens have borne and continue to bear enormous financial costs for maintaining the Ukrainian state and its army, and that without external support, Ukrainian taxpayers cannot sustain a combat-ready army or ensure basic state functions.
Kaczyński specifically criticized the decision to name an important Ukrainian military unit—which he says is paid for by Poles—after the murderers of the Polish population in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia, calling it an incredibly audacious and disrespectful act. He had previously called for blocking new rounds of EU accession negotiations in the context of this scandal over the UPA unit's name.
It should be recalled that on July 3, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha proposed a package of anti-crisis measures during a meeting in Warsaw with Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski to defuse tensions in bilateral relations.
