Military refugees complain about abuse in Poland

Sweetlane says her daughter loved the school in Poland.

“Even when we moved to another area, she did not want to change schools,” says a 31-year-old Ukrainian mother. “She liked it so much. There was no bullying.”

Now she says that the atmosphere at school – and in Poland as a whole – has changed.

“Two weeks ago, she came home and said,” One boy said to me today, “Return to Ukraine.” “The light was surprised.

It is one of the dozens of Ukrainians living in Poland who said the BBC that anti-Ukrainian sentiment has grown significantly in recent months.

Many have described what they feel in public transportation, the bullying in schools and xenophobic material on the Internet.

The polarization presidential election campaign added tensions, and the first round of voting took place on Sunday.

The day after his daughter Switlans were ordered to return to Ukraine, the abuse was even worse.

“Girls from the class above began to complain about the Ukrainian conversation and laughs,” says Svitlana. “She came home, crying.”

The Russian rocket crashed into the hometown of Svitlana in Ukraine a few days earlier, killing dozens of civilians, including children. Her daughter was injured.

Switthel – Not her real name did not want to identify as she Fear of repression. She showed us screenshots of messages with the school staff, where she complains about the treatment of her daughter.

She said she noticed the relationships that change to the Ukrainians in other places: “At work, many people say that Ukrainians come here and behave badly. And my Ukrainian friends say they want to return home because Polish people don’t accept us. Now it’s scary to live here.”

According to state statistics, at least 2.5 million Ukrainians live in Poland, which is almost 7% of the total population of Poland.

When a full -scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022, a compassion from the Poles took place. “It was strange. Every day people called, asking, ‘How can we help? “,-the activist Natalia Panchenko, the head of the Stand from Ukraine, is based in Warsaw.

“Some of them organized humanitarian columns or brought fugitives here. They gave their homes, food, all that is, and their hearts.”

Three years later, Natalia says that most Poles still support Ukraine. But some do not do it-and her organization noticed the rise of the anti-Ukrainian online connection, which began a few months ago.

“Then it started to come into real life,” she says. “Recently, we have more and more similar situations … xenophobic (abuse) people who work in shops or hotels just because they are talking to a Ukrainian accent.”

Natalia says many Ukrainian refugees are injured. “These groups of women and children are in Poland from the war, very often their relatives are on the front line, in captivity or the dead … And this is a group of people who are aiming.”

Studies show that the public opinion of the Ukrainians is really deteriorating. According to a poll on March 2025, the CBOS Dear Center, only 50% of the Poles advocate Ukrainian refugees, falling seven interest points in four months. Two years ago, this figure was 81%.

About one million Ukrainians are officially registered after a full -scale invasion. Poland spends 4.2% of its GDP on Ukrainian refugees.

Ukraine has become a political problem with the hot button in Poland’s most important presidential election campaign.

The far-right populist Slavomir Mentoce, who is currently among the third, is a brazen anti-Ukraine and supports the “agreement” from Russia Vladimir Putin.

In the second place is the conservative Karol Navaroki, who opposes EU and NATO membership for Ukraine and financial assistance to refugees, but supports military efforts.

The most candidate from Ukraine is the front-line Rafal Trzaskovsky of the Prime Minister Donald Tusk coalition, although he even promised to reduce social security for Ukrainians.

Trzaskouski refrained from supporting his pro -Raine powers to draw voting for the centralists in the election, says political analyst Martin Zaborovsky.

“He responds to changes in public views. The initial enthusiasm for the support of the military victims disappears, the negative sentiments imitate, and it is not quite comfortable for him.”

Another extremely right -wing candidate, Greek Bruna, is under the investigation of the police for cutting the Ukrainian flag from the City Hall during the elections in April. Brown, which conducts a survey by only 3%, is regularly filled against what he calls “Poland’s Ukrainian”.

Last week, the Polish government warned of Russia’s “unprecedented attempt” to intervene in Polish elections, distributing “false information to Polish citizens on the Internet”. Moscow denies all charges.

Michal Marek, who manages a non-governmental organization that monitors misinformation and propaganda in Poland, offers several examples of anti-Ukrainian material that spreads to social media.

“The main stories are that the Ukrainians steal money from the Polish budget, that the Ukrainians do not respect us, that they want to rob and kill us and are responsible for the war,” he says.

“This information begins in Russian telegram channels, and after that we see the same photos and the same text that is only translated by Google Translate. And they press (material) into the Polish Infosphere.”

Mr. Marek connects such misinformation directly with the increase in anti-Ukraine sentiment in Poland, and says that an increasing number of poles are influenced by propaganda.

“But we will see the effect only after the election – what percentage of the Poles wants to vote for openly pro -Russian candidates.”