The Kremlin on Wednesday furiously reacted to Poland’s decision to revert the name of the Russian city of Kaliningrad on Polish maps to a historical title, calling the move “madness” and evidence of Russophobia.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the renaming of the Russian exclave city to the Polish historical name of Krolewiec demonstrated Poland’s “hatred of the Russians.”
“This is not even Russophobia any longer,” Peskov told reporters, according to Russian state-run outlet TASS. “These are processes that verge on madness that are taking place in Poland.”
The designation of Krolewiec will only be referred to as such on Polish maps, after a government commission recommended the change.
Kaliningrad, administered by Russian authorities, is on the Baltic Sea, sandwiched between Poland to the south and Lithuania to the north and east.
Formerly known by the Germanic name of Königsberg, the city was inhabited by Prussians and Germans for centuries — and for a period of time by Poland — before it was ceded to the Soviet Union after World War II.
The Soviet Union renamed the city to Kaliningrad after Mikhail Kalinin, an original leader of the Bolshevik revolution in the early 20th century, which brought communism to Russia and ultimately formed the Soviet federation.
On Tuesday, the Polish government commission officially changed the name of Kaliningrad to Krolewiec. Polish authorities said Kalinin was responsible for the death of 21,000 Polish prisoners of war in 1940, and the name of Krolewiec is part of its cultural heritage.
Officials said names in general carry symbolic weight and called the Russian designation “an artificial baptism unrelated to either the city or the region.”
“The events related to the Russian invasion of Ukraine … make us take a different look at the issue of imposed names, which arouse great controversy and do not meet with acceptance in Poland,” the commission said, according to the Polish newspaper Rzeczpospolita.
Dmitry Medvedev, a key ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, ripped the change in a tweet Wednesday, calling the authorities responsible for the decision “Polish Russophobes” and mocking the country’s history.
Poland, a NATO member, has donated weapons and munitions to Ukraine in the war against Russia.
The country, led by Poland President Andrzej Duda and Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, has been one of the most vocal in the western security alliance regarding efforts to provide more advanced weaponry to Kyiv.
Political tensions have soared between Poland and Russia during the war. On Tuesday, Polish protesters in Warsaw physically prevented the Russian ambassador to Poland from visiting the gravesite of fallen Soviet soldiers on Victory Day, a huge day of celebration in Russia commemorating the nation’s victory over Nazi Germany in World War II.