Negative views of Polish-Ukrainian relations reach highest level on record in Poland

Keep our news free from ads and paywalls by making a donation to support our work!

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.

The proportion of Poles who hold a negative view of Polish-Ukrainian relations has risen to 46%, the highest figure ever recorded by Polish state research agency CBOS. Only 12% think relations are good. By contrast, three years ago, in mid-2023, only 3% had a negative view and 64% a positive one.

Meanwhile, CBOS also found that belief among Poles that reconciliation between the two neighbours, who share a difficult history, is possible is at its lowest level on record, 53%, down from 78% three years ago.

The findings follow other polls showing worsening attitudes towards Ukraine and Ukrainians in Poland in recent years, and come amid an ongoing diplomatic crisis triggered by President Volodymyr Zelensky naming a military unit after a group that massacred Poles in World War Two.

Relations between Poland and Ukraine improved significantly in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, as Poland welcomed millions of Ukrainian refugees and provided Kyiv with extensive military, humanitarian and diplomatic support.

However, since 2023, those relations have been hit by a series of controversies over Ukrainian agricultural exports, border blockades by Polish farmers and truckers, and, above all, over the two nations’ difficult World War Two history.

Among Poles who now hold a negative view of relations, CBOS also asked them who was responsible for the situation. A large majority, 65%, primarily blamed Ukraine, while only 4% said it was Poland’s fault and 28% placed responsibility on both sides.

In its regular surveys since 1997, the agency has also asked Poles if they believe that reconciliation between Poles and Ukrainians is possible or not. In the early 2000s, that figure rose to a record level of 81%, and in 2023 it still stood at 78%. Now, however, it has dropped to an all-time low of 53%.

There have long been tensions between Poland and Ukraine over their difficult, intertwined histories, in particular during the first half of the 20th century.

In World War Two, Ukrainian nationalists killed around 100,000 Polish civilians, mostly women and children, in an ethnic-cleansing operation known as the Volhynia massacres.

Poland has officially recognised that episode as a genocide. However, Ukraine rejects that label and also points to the persecution of Ukrainians who lived in the interwar Polish state, as well as to massacres of Ukrainians by Polish groups during World War Two.

Those tensions recently boiled over after Zelensky, in May this year, approved a request to rename a military unit after the “heroes of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA)”, the group that led the Volhynia massacres but is remembered positively in Ukraine for its role in fighting Moscow-imposed Soviet rule.

Zelensky’s decision prompted his Polish counterpart, Karol Nawrocki, to strip the Ukrainian president of Poland’s highest honour. While tensions have since calmed somewhat, the dispute remains unresolved.

However, even before that diplomatic crisis broke out, polling showed increasingly negative attitudes in Poland towards both Ukraine and Ukrainians, who are by far the country’s largest immigrant group.

In its annual survey of attitudes towards various national and ethnic groups, published in February, CBOS found that the proportion of Poles who said they disliked Ukrainians had increased by five percentage points year-on-year, to 43%. Only 29% said they liked Ukrainians.

In January, CBOS reported that opposition to accepting Ukrainian refugees in Poland had risen to its highest ever level. In December 2024, a poll in Ukraine found that positive sentiment towards Poles had fallen by half in the space of two years.

Meanwhile, the number of reported hate crimes against Ukrainians in Poland rose by 30% in the first half of 2026, including a number of high-profile incidents.

Poland’s government has blamed increasing anti-Ukrainian rhetoric from the right-wing and far-right opposition. Last month, Ukraine’s foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, called on “Polish politicians to stop inciting hatred against Ukrainians”.

CBOS’s new study shows that attitudes towards relations with Ukraine differ significantly depending on political affiliation.

Whereas 35% of supporters of the centrist Civic Coalition (KO), Poland’s main ruling party, hold a negative view of relations, that rises to 52% among voters of the national-conservative opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party and 81% for the far-right Confederation (Konfederacja).

Among those with a negative view, 49% of KO voters blamed Poland and Ukraine equally for the situation while 10% blamed mainly Poland. By contrast, 86% of Confederation supporters and 82% of PiS supporters placed responsibility on the Ukrainian side.

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: Inka Kapturewska/Pexels

Olivier Sorgho

Olivier Sorgho is senior editor at Notes from Poland, covering politics, business and society. He previously worked for Reuters.