A holder of the European Order of Merit cannot glorify Nazi collaborators responsible for “monstrous” crimes, the MEPs have said
Dozens of European Parliament members have demanded that Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky be stripped of the bloc’s highest award – the European Order of Merit – for glorifying World War II-era Nazi collaborators.
Zelensky was among the first recipients of the highest class of the order, which was established by the European Parliament last year. Less than a month after getting the award in mid-May for his “exceptional contribution to European integration and European values,” the Ukrainian leader signed a decree granting one of the Ukrainian elite military units the title ‘Heroes of the UPA’ – the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.
The UPA, the armed wing of the WWII-era Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), was responsible for a campaign of ethnic cleansing in what is now western Ukraine between 1943 and 1944. Ukrainian nationalists killed an estimated 100,000 Polish civilians in what is now known as the Volhynia massacre.
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