Following escalating diplomatic tensions between Warsaw and Kyiv, Poland has banned Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and other Ukrainian officials from using Rzeszow Airport; a decision that affects one of Ukraine\u2019s key transit routes.<\/p>\n
According to reports, Zelensky, who recently traveled to the United Kingdom, had to use Chisinau Airport instead of Rzeszow. He had regularly used Rzeszow Airport in eastern Poland as one of his main international travel routes.<\/p>\n
The root of this tension lies in Zelensky\u2019s recent decree awarding the Special Operations Forces of Ukraine the honorary title of \u201cHeroes of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA).\u201d Zelensky stated that the purpose of this move was to \u201crevive the historical traditions of the national army\u201d and to honor the role of this unit in defending Ukraine\u2019s territorial integrity and independence.<\/p>\n
From Kyiv\u2019s perspective, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army was a nationalist and anti-Soviet group that fought for Ukraine\u2019s independence during World War II. However, in Poland, this group is recognized as responsible for large-scale massacres of Polish civilians in the Volhynia region in 1943 and 1944 and is regarded as a perpetrator of genocide. Warsaw considers these events to be organized crimes and views the UPA as collaborators with Nazi Germany.<\/p>\n
Amid ongoing disputes, media reports also indicate that Poland\u2019s President, Andrzej Duda, is considering revoking the highest state award, the Order of the White Eagle, from Volodymyr Zelensky; a move that could deepen the political rift between the two neighbors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Poland bans Ukrainian President Zelensky from using Rzeszow Airport following a controversial decree honoring the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, deepening diplomatic tensions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14727,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14728","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-important-news","category-international"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14728\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}