Far-right presidential candidate investigated over removal of Ukrainian flag from Polish city hall

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Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and is published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Poland’s justice minister has announced that police and prosecutors are investigating far-right presidential candidate Grzegorz Braun for his involvement in an incident in which a Ukrainian flag hung outside a Polish city hall in solidarity with Ukraine was removed.

The stunt has also been criticised by Ukraine’s ambassador to Poland, as well as politicians from Poland’s main ruling party.

Braun, who has a long history of attacking minorities and promoting conspiracy theories, has regularly stirred controversy during the current campaign. He is already under investigation by police and prosecutors over incidents in which he vandalised an LGBT+ exhibition and used anti-Jewish language.

The latest stunt took place during Braun’s rally in the city of Biała Podlaska in eastern Poland on Wednesday. A man – introduced by Braun as his assistant – climbed a ladder outside city hall while Braun stood at the bottom.

The man then removed the Ukrainian flag hanging from the building. Many public and private buildings in Poland have Ukrainian flags hanging (alongside Polish ones) as a sign of support for and solidarity with Ukraine in its resistance to Russian aggression.

“I call all of you as witnesses that…my assistant…at my request and my express order, did what he did. Therefore, it is my responsibility,” said Braun, quoted by new website Niezależna. He then announced that he will pass the flag to the Ukrainian consulate.

Braun has long railed against what he calls the “Ukrainisation of Poland”, referring to the large number of Ukrainian migrants and refugees that have settled there as well as Poland’s strong support of Ukraine. His supporters declared Wednesday’s flag incident to be a “repolonisation of city hall”.

However, politicians from Poland’s main ruling party, the centrist Civic Platform (PO), condemned Braun’s actions. “This is not patriotism, it is a disgrace,” wrote PO MEP Marta Wcisło. “The politics of hatred are taking their toll.”

The mayor of Biała Podlaska, Michał Litwiniuk, who also comes from PO, accused Braun of “pro-Putin propaganda” and said that a Ukrainian flag would again be hung at city hall, reports news website Onet.

Ukraine’s ambassador to Poland, Vasyl Bodnar, meanwhile, called Braun’s actions a “deliberate provocation…aimed against Polish-Ukrainian friendship”.

He urged people to “stand up to such provocations together, especially during the time of Russia’s ongoing brutal war against Ukraine, when we are fighting for our common security”.

Local police issued a statement saying that they have established the personal information of the man who took down the Ukrainian flag and are analysing recordings from the event and securing other evidence.

“We will not allow attacks on public buildings, removing state flags, or incitement to break the law,” wrote the police. “Legal consequences will be drawn against those responsible for such behaviour.”

Justice minister Adam Bodnar later confirmed that “police and prosecutors are taking action in the matter of the outrageous events at the rally in Biała Podlaska…Grzegorz Braun’s excesses will not go unpunished”.

Braun – a minor presidential candidate currently polling around 2% – has a long history of conducting similar stunts aimed at expressing his opposition to various religious, ethnic, national and sexual minorities, as well as women’s reproductive rights.

In March, he vandalised an exhibition about LGBT+ people, graffitiing “Stop the propaganda of perversion” on display boards that had been set up on the market square in a Polish city.

Most infamously, in December 2023, Braun sprayed Hanukkah candles with a fire extinguisher during a ceremony in the Polish parliament, an incident for which he was later charged.

On Wednesday this week, prosecutors confirmed they have opened an investigation into Braun after a fellow presidential candidate accused him of inciting hatred towards Jews during a televised debate in which he expressed opposition to the “Judaisation” of Poland.

Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Main image credit: Robert Kowalewski / Agencja Wyborcza.pl

Agata Pyka

Agata Pyka is an assistant editor at Notes from Poland. She is a journalist and a political communication student at the University of Amsterdam. She specialises in Polish and European politics as well as investigative journalism and has previously written for Euractiv and The European Correspondent.