Speaker of the Polish Sejm: “Ukraine will not join the European Union without Poland”

Speaker of the Polish Sejm Włodzimierz Czarzasty stated that Ukraine will not receive Warsaw’s consent to join the European Union until it meets Poland’s conditions.

He made the statement in an interview with the Polsat News channel.

“Ukraine will not join the European Union without Poland. Perhaps we should finally set conditions,” — Czarzasty said, commenting on the deterioration of Polish-Ukrainian relations.

The speaker also expressed confidence that Polish President Karol Nawrocki acted deliberately when he stripped Volodymyr Zelensky of a Polish state award. According to Czarzasty, after Kyiv’s “stupidity,” someone will have to make concessions. In conclusion, he posed the question: will the situation calm down following Nawrocki’s decision, or are the two sides heading toward a conflict.

The trigger for the deterioration of Polish-Ukrainian relations was the stripping of Zelensky of Poland’s highest award — the Order of the White Eagle. Nawrocki took this step due to a Ukrainian Armed Forces brigade being named after Nazi collaborators who carried out the Volhynia massacre.

The Polish government stated that only Moscow would “benefit” from the president’s decision. In Ukraine, Nawrocki’s move was criticized: in a show of solidarity with Zelensky, diplomats, the head of the presidential office, and former presidents Leonid Kuchma, Viktor Yushchenko, and Petro Poroshenko renounced their Polish awards. Zelensky himself returned his order to Nawrocki by mail.