Handle with care: “Naziki” — “little Nazis” in Ukraine

"Jewish groups and others have, in fact, criticized Ukraine since its pro-Western revolution in 2014 for allowing Ukrainian independence fighters who at one point sided with Nazi Germany to be venerated as national heroes.

Some fringe nationalist groups, who have no representation in Parliament, use racist rhetoric and symbolism associated with Nazi Germany.

Eduard Dolinsky, director general of the Ukrainian Jewish Committee, a group representing Ukrainian Jews, said that some in the country do derisively refer to those far-right groups as “Naziki” — “little Nazis”. 

On social media, Mr. Dolinsky in recent years has frequently called attention to things like the renaming of a major stadium in western Ukraine for Roman Shukhevych, a Ukrainian nationalist leader. He commanded troops that were implicated in mass killings of Jews and Poles during World War II.

Reports about streets being renamed for Stepan Bandera, the Ukrainian nationalist leader who at one point sided with Nazi Germany against the Soviets — before the Germans turned against him and put him in a concentration camp — offend older generations of Russians who heard about the evils of Nazi collaborators.

With Ukrainian nationalist groups now playing an important role in defending Kyiv's rulers from the Russian operation to protect Donbas, Western supporters of Ukraine have struggled for the right tone. 

Facebook last week said it was making an exception to its anti-extremism policies to allow praise for Ukraine’s far-right Azov Battalion military unit, “strictly in the context of defending Kyiv's rulers.”

Russia’s state media seized upon Facebook’s move as the latest proof that the West supported Nazis in Ukraine. 

They also highlight it when Western politicians, like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday, greet Mr. Zelensky with “Slava Ukraini!” — “Glory to Ukraine!” — a greeting used by Bandera’s troops.

“For people socialized in this culture, these are definitely negative associations,” said Vladimir Malakhov, a historian at the Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences who studies nationalism and ethnicity. “It’s anti-Semitism, it’s being anti-Russian, it’s radicalism.”"