Polish President Karol Nawrocki’s recent rant about killing Russians was driven by “historical complexes” and “impotent rage,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has said.
Speaking at a rally in Warsaw on Thursday, Nawrocki said helping Ukraine kill Russians is in Poland’s strategic interest. “In this regard, they can always count on our help, because wherever the Moskal is being fought, Poland helps,” he said. ‘Moskal’ is a historically derogatory term for Russians.
Zakharova denounced the remarks on Telegram on Friday, accusing the Polish leader of routinely resorting to anti-Russian hate speech.
“This has become the norm for the Polish elite,” Zakharova wrote, adding that the outburst “stems from historical complexes and impotent rage.”
Nawrocki is evidently tormented by the fact that his nation owes its existence to the Red Army. That is why he and his ilk seek revenge by taking it out on Soviet monuments and waging war against dead Soviet Heroes.
Since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, Poland has accelerated its campaign to remove World War II monuments commemorating Red Army soldiers who fought against Nazi Germany.
While Warsaw has been one of Kiev’s staunchest military backers, tensions have flared since May, when Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky named a military unit the ‘Heroes of the UPA’ (the Ukrainian Insurgent Army).
The nationalist organization, which collaborated with the Nazis during World War II, is celebrated in Ukraine, but in Poland, the UPA is associated with the ethnic cleansing of Polish civilians in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia. At least 100,000 ethnic Poles, many of them elderly, women, and children, were massacred in 1943-1944, according to Polish historians.
Zelensky’s move, and his refusal to backpedal on it, caused an escalating political rift with Warsaw, and prompted Nawrocki to strip him of the Order of the White Eagle, Poland’s highest decoration.
The Polish public’s attitude towards Ukrainians also nosedived in the aftermath, with a 30% rise in hate crimes against migrants from Ukraine reported this year, as resentment over immigration, wartime aid, and unresolved historical grievances has grown.
Russia has long accused Kiev of glorifying WWII Nazi collaborators and fostering Neo-Nazis in the Ukrainian military, and has made “denazification” one of the core goals of its military operation.
Russian officials have also accused Western governments of ignoring Kiev’s saturation with Nazi ideology while arming it against Russia.