It was easy to see a contrast. Whereas Czech president Petr Pavel publicly embraced a Ukrainian girl humiliated by her classmates, just a month later his Polish counterpart Karol Nawrocki vetoed a bill that would have extended legal residency rights for Ukrainians in Poland. One of Poland’s leading liberal-oriented publicists, Sławomir Sierakowski, a critic of right-wing president Nawrocki, was sure to highlight the opposition in the two leaders’ treatment of refugees. One president signals compassion, the other enacts exclusion.

But in Poland, this exclusion has become a central language of power. Not only far-right figures but also liberal forces compete to show how firmly they can “protect the Polish taxpayer” from supposed foreign freeloaders.

Still, Nawrocki’s veto of a new Ukraine aid law passed by parliament, which would have extended legal residency for refugees until 2026, makes one thing clear already. By blocking the extension of the provisions first introduced in 2022, he has forced hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians — and the firms that employ them — into legal uncertainty.