Poland Bans Lviv Councillor From Schengen Over ‘Year of UPA’ Push

Poland has banned Lviv regional councillor Sviatoslav Sheremeta from entering the Schengen area for five years, after he initiated a decision to declare 2027 the year of Roman Shukhevych, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) and Oleh Olzhych in the Lviv region, Polish Interior Minister Marcin Kierwinski announced on October 21.

Entry ban until October 2031

Kierwinski wrote on X that, at the request of Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski, Sheremeta was entered in the register of undesirable persons, barred from entering and staying in the Schengen countries for five years, until October 20, 2031. Earlier on Wednesday Sikorski said he had signed the order. Sheremeta chairs the culture commission of the Lviv regional council and directs the memorial and search centre “Dolia.” In October the centre carried out search work in the village of Laskiv in Poland’s Lublin Voivodeship, at the site of a mass killing of Ukrainians, where preliminary estimates point to the remains of more than 40 people.

Sheremeta told ZAXID.NET that he finds the reaction of Polish officials strange. Similar decisions declaring years of the UPA and Shukhevych have been taken repeatedly, he said, not only by the Lviv council but by other regional councils, and the decision was not directed against Poles or Poland. He believes the entry ban will hurt bilateral cooperation in commemorating victims.

Military aid package reportedly paused

Separately, a source in the Ukrainian government told European Pravda that Poland has suspended the delivery of a military aid package because of the council’s vote. According to the source, the deputies voted just as the large Polish package was being prepared for dispatch. “Because of their irresponsible actions, the delivery of this package is now suspended. Active work is under way through closed channels to settle a problem created out of nothing,” the source said.

The Lviv regional council voted on October 20 to declare 2027 the “year of Roman Shukhevych, the Ukrainian Insurgent Army and Oleh Olzhych.” Polish Defence Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz said the decision damages relations between the two countries. Prime Minister Donald Tusk said such a step helps Ukraine’s enemies, as we reported in Tusk: Lviv’s ‘Year of UPA’ for 2027 Harms Ukraine.

Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry stressed that the deputies’ decision was taken at the regional level without consulting diplomats or central authorities and is “counterproductive,” as the ministry said earlier. A deputy head of the Polish Foreign Ministry said Ukraine had given assurances that the council’s decision would not take effect.