Poland phases out aid for Ukrainian refugees

WARSAW, Poland (AFP) — A new law limiting social benefits for Ukrainian refugees in Poland entered into force on Thursday, just over a week after Russia’s war in Ukraine entered its fifth year.

Passed in late January, the law aims to phase out assistance for Ukrainian refugees with new curbs on social benefits, medical care, legal stay and education granted to them after the 2022 invasion.

Under the new law, special healthcare benefits will only be provided to minors, working people, victims of torture or rape and vulnerable groups living in collective accommodation.

“After four years, the situation is more stable,” Adam Szlapka, spokesman for Poland’s pro-European government, said when the measure was first announced. “These extraordinary regulations can be phased out and we can move from temporary solutions to systemic ones.”

Food and housing assistance will only apply to groups deemed particularly vulnerable.

For Ukrainian pupils in Polish schools, funding for free transport, material assistance and additional Polish language lessons will continue only until the end of the academic year.

Ukrainian refugees will still have protected status in Poland until at least March next year.

Poland was the entry point for millions of Ukrainian refugees crossing into Europe at the invasion’s outset, and remains a critical hub for the delivery of humanitarian and military aid.

But public opinion in Poland has soured since the beginning of the war.

According to a January poll by Poland’s Center for Public Opinion Research, only 48% of Poles approve of helping Ukrainians fleeing the war, while 46% are opposed.

This is the lowest level of support since Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014.

Conservative-nationalist Polish President Karol Nawrocki has echoed this sentiment, announcing at the start of his term last year that he would not sign any “law concerning special assistance to Ukrainian citizens.”

He stressed this point in a December news conference with his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy, saying “Poles feel … that our effort, our multifaceted assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of the full-scale invasion has not been duly appreciated or understood.”

But this sentiment has been criticised by rights groups.

“The year 2025 was the deadliest for civilians in Ukraine since the start of the full-scale invasion,” the spokeswoman for the Polish branch of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, wrote in a press release Thursday.

“No part of Ukraine is safe, and 10.8 million people still require humanitarian assistance.”

According to the Polish interior ministry, from February 2022 to December 2024 an estimated 1.6 million Ukrainians — mainly women and children — found shelter in Poland.

In 2024, Poland’s Ukrainian workforce accounted for 2.7% of GDP, amounting to more than the total Polish aid contribution, according to a Deloitte report for the UNHCR.

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By Agence France-Presse