Maciej Wewiór, the Polish foreign ministry’s spokesman, said it was striking that Russia had once again "resorted to falsifying history."
His remarks were a response to statements by Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, who claimed that without Lenin "Poland would not exist at all" and described the Bolshevik leader as an architect of Polish independence.
Writing on the social media platform X on Tuesday, Wewiór strongly rejected those claims, stating that Poland’s independence "was not a gift from Lenin," just as Soviet domination of Central Europe could not be described as "liberation."
"If Poland owed its independence to Lenin, then the Polish–Bolshevik War of 1920 would have had to be a Russian humanitarian action – or, in today’s language, a 'special military operation,'" Wewiór said.
"In reality, it was Poland that stopped Bolshevik expansion," he added.
Russia fequently uses the term "special military operation" to describe its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Wewiór said that Poland’s historical experience with Russia has shaped its contemporary political choices, including its firm commitment to NATO.
The diplomatic exchange followed a post by Poland’s Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski, who shared a video of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán criticising an EU decision to indefinitely freeze Russian assets held in the bloc.
Sikorski remarked that the Hungarian leader had "earned his Order of Lenin," a comment that prompted Zakharova’s response.
Lenin is widely regarded by historians as responsible for the introduction of state terror and mass political repression.
As the leader of Soviet Russia, Lenin opposed an independent Polish state and supported Bolshevik efforts to defeat Poland during the 1919-1920 war.
Russia has frequently been accused by Poland and other Central and Eastern European states of distorting historical facts in order to justify past Soviet actions and current foreign policy positions.
(ał/gs)
Source: PAP