Polish media have revealed two hidden motives behind Nawrocki’s decision to take Order of White Eagle from Zelenskyy

The decision by Polish President Karol Nawrocki to strip Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy of the Order of the White Eagle a week before the Conference on the Reconstruction of Ukraine in Gdańsk was driven purely by domestic political considerations.

This is reported by the Onet portal, citing sources in the Polish Prime Minister’s Office, according to Censor.NET.

Theme One

The International Conference on the Reconstruction of Ukraine (URC 2026) in Gdańsk is a key personal and diplomatic project for Donald Tusk and Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Successfully attracting billions in investment and securing the attendance of world leaders would automatically represent a colossal electoral triumph for the incumbent prime minister in the run-up to the 2027 parliamentary elections.

Sources at the Prime Minister’s Office cited by the publication state explicitly that the country’s president sought to undermine this success at any cost:

"Nawrocki clearly wanted to push relations with the Ukrainians to breaking point and ensure that Zelenskyy’s visit to the conference in Gdańsk was cancelled. That is why he announced the revocation of the order a week before the conference", the publication quotes a senior official from the Prime Minister’s Office as saying.

Reason number two: the KO Party’s medical scandal

According to the publication, the second motive was to divert attention from an internal scandal: the popular website Zero had published a damning exposé about the existence of a secret system of privileged VIP medical care for select politicians at a leading Warsaw hospital. This dealt a severe blow to the party’s image in the run-up to the 2027 elections.

Nawrocki's decision to revoke the order was deliberately announced on Friday evening, which completely overshadowed the medical scandal in Saturday’s newspapers and on television.

Zelenskyy took pre-emptive action

According to sources within the Polish government, the President of Ukraine saw through this ploy — and returned the order of his own accord, without waiting for Tusk’s countersignature. This move completely thwarted Nawrocki's plan, depriving him of the opportunity to drag the Prime Minister into an open political war.

Tusk himself subsequently publicly sided with Kyiv, stating in advance that under no circumstances did he intend to endorse the anti-Ukrainian initiatives of the Nawrocki administration with his signature, describing the disputes with Ukraine as "a source of joy for Putin and a shock to our allies".

What led up to it?

Polish President Karol Nawrocki has stripped Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of the country’s highest honour, the Order of the White Eagle, amid a scandal over the naming of an elite unit of the Ukrainian Special Operations Forces after the Heroes of the UPA.

In response, a number of Ukrainian officials issued statements:

The Ukrainian Foreign Minister, A ndrii Sybiha, has declined the Commander’s Cross with Star of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland in response to the decision by the President of Poland, Karol Nawrocki, to strip Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Poland’s highest honour, the Order of the White Eagle;
The Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, Kyrylo Budanov, declined the Order of Merit of Poland;
Ukraine’s Ambassador to Poland Vasyl Bodnar also announced that he would return his Polish honour following the stripping of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of the Order of the White Eagle.
On 20 June, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy awarded the Order of the White Eagle to the President of Poland, Karol Nawrocki.
The second President of Ukraine, Leonid Kuchma, the third President of Ukraine, Viktor Yushchenko, and the fifth President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko also announced that they were declining the Polish Order of the White Eagle.