Ukraine's wartime identity, not nationalism, drives historical choices, analyst says

Ukrainian political analyst Yevhen Mahda says Kyiv's recent decisions honoring figures from Ukraine's 20th-century independence movement reflect a wartime search for national identity, not a nationalist turn.

FILE PHOTO: People gather to mark the 117th birthday of Stepan Bandera near his monument in Lviv, Ukraine, 01 January 2026. Born on 01 January 1909 in what was then Galicia and Lodomeria, Stepan Bandera became a leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and OUN-B. He was responsible for the proclamation of an independent Ukrainian

EPA/MYKOLA TYS

His remarks came after the naming of a Ukrainian Special Operations Forces unit after "Heroes of the UPA" and President Volodymyr Zelensky's participation in the reburial ceremony of OUN leader Andriy Melnyk drew sharp reactions in Poland.

Mahda said the naming of the military unit was a grassroots initiative, not a top-down directive. "This was an initiative of that Special Operations Forces subunit, not a decision made at the top. It is a way of honoring those who fought for Ukrainian independence", he said.

For many Ukrainians, he argued, the UPA functions primarily as a symbol of statehood, not of ethnic violence. "Members of the UPA also fought against Nazism, and against Communism", he said.

Mahda attributed Polish political reactions partly to domestic electoral dynamics. "Ukrainians will be the scapegoat of this campaign — for the right, which is quite natural, but also for [ruling centrist] Civic Coalition", he said, noting Poland's parliamentary campaign had effectively already begun.

Poland and Ukraine have long disagreed over the legacy of the OUN and UPA. Polish historians designate the 1943 massacres of Poles in Volhynia as genocide; Ukrainian accounts more commonly frame the events as a mutual armed conflict.

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Source: PAP