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Marta Havrisko, a Ukrainian historian and Holocaust studies scholar working in the United States, says Zelensky’s state honors for Andriy Melnyk and the repatriation and reburial of Melnyk’s remains in Ukraine marks a “turning point” in Ukraine’s politics of memory. She argues Melnyk was a leader within the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), part of the cult of the Ukrainian Nationalist Movement originating in Western Ukraine and later becoming more visible on the national level after the Maidan Revolution. She says Melnyk’s background includes Nazi collaboration: she describes his people and subordinates collaborating with Nazis in auxiliary police units, hunting Jews, guarding ghettos, convoying Jews to killing sites, and participating in shootings. She also says Melnyk supported creating a Waffen SS Division Galicia and that its members pay tribute to Hitler; she further claims they were involved in anti-Nazi partisan suppression in Slovakia and former Yugoslavia.
Havrisko says she was shocked that this event occurred under Zelensky rather than earlier presidents with nationalistic agendas, and she frames her reaction as shame and anger, claiming the discussion was not accompanied by a public debate about whether a “Nazi collaborator” should be honored in democratic Ukraine. She adds that Zelensky’s career involved mocking Ukrainian nationalism, particularly its antisemitism and chauvinism, and she criticizes what she describes as Zelensky adopting a false familiarity with the complex history of the nationalist movement and its “crimes against humanity.”
She links the broader memory shift to laws on memory adopted about ten years earlier under Poroshenko, including decommunization laws recognizing OUN and related groups (including the UPA and DP A as she mentions them) as fighters for Ukrainian independence. Havrisko says two unresolved questions remain: what kind of state the groups desired (she characterizes it as a territorial, ethnic state) and the tools used (she describes brutal ethnic violence against Jews, Russians, and Poles, including elderly people, children, and women). She argues that while Ukraine presents itself as moving toward Europe’s family of nations, it is simultaneously celebrating Nazi collaborators, shifting from a Soviet “myth” to a nationalist “myth” to mobilize society for war against Russia.
She claims that seven million Ukrainians fought against Nazis, but that fallen Nazi collaborators are now marked as national heroes while others are described as Soviet collaborators or occupiers. She says a large share of Ukrainians voted against this approach in 2019 and that public discussion was not organized because the Office of the President informed the public rather than holding debate.
Havrisko also points to the military dimension. She says Ukraine’s army is approximately one million people and 120 brigades, and highlights the Third Assault Brigade as rooted in the Nazi Azov movement. She describes problematic figures linked to this brigade (including an individual she names with references to Nazi symbols and a frontman associated with Holocaust denial), and says these figures were present at the state funeral with top military and state officials. She adds that the same brigade allegedly celebrated the creation anniversary of the Waffen SS Division Galicia but remained silent on May 8, when Ukraine marked the end of World War II and mourned Nazism’s victims. She describes this as a symptom of memory politics turning into World War II revisionism, Holocaust distortion, and Nazi apology.
She further argues that Germany has sponsored many monuments and memory sites in Ukraine but remained silent, with mainstream German media and officials not issuing criticism. She questions why Germany appears to recognize threats in other contexts while not criticizing Ukraine’s alleged glorification of neo-Nazis and collaboration.
In discussing reactions from abroad, Havrisko describes Polish outrage after Melnyk-related honors, including protests by Polish officials. She says Ukraine and Poland disagree about apologies and that in Ukraine some “liberal people” adopted a far-right formula such as “Our land, our heroes.” She criticizes European politicians and Western media, saying they elevate Ukrainians with a “messiah complex,” fund state initiatives honoring nationalist collaborators, and avoid questioning this memory framework.
She expands her critique to broader war politics. She says the normalization of nationalist and militarized ideology in society is directed toward mobilization, censorship, and hate, and argues it harms social cohesion and alienates partners. She claims Ukrainian men are being forced into service in ways she describes as brutal, and she describes mass vulnerability and coercion. She also says Western leaders frame the war as short-term and manageable for Ukraine, while other reporting suggests a longer horizon; she describes a narrative she sees as “fairy tales” and says Ukrainian losses are treated as mere numbers.
Towards the end, Havrisko frames the debate in Europe as binary—pro-Ukraine versus pro-Russia—and says criticism of Ukrainian nationalist commemoration or concern about Ukrainian suffering is treated as siding with Russia. She contrasts this with her view that alternative proposals, such as a security arrangement with Russia and reduced NATO expansion, would be labeled “pro-Russian.” She recounts that, in her view, even statements by Western figures arguing Ukrainians should be used to weaken Russia are treated as “pro-Ukrainian” because they serve the weakening of Russia.
She concludes by saying she hopes the war ends due to “too much suffering,” and hopes that programs and discourse like the one discussed will undermine mainstream hawkish narratives in the West that keep feeding the war.