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Poland Drops Passport Plan That Angered Ukraine, Lithuania


FILE - Ukrainian (L) and Polish border guards check passports during their joint work at a checkpoint at the Polish-Ukrainian border in Hrebenne, Apr. 18, 2012.
FILE - Ukrainian (L) and Polish border guards check passports during their joint work at a checkpoint at the Polish-Ukrainian border in Hrebenne, Apr. 18, 2012.

The Polish government is abandoning a plan to include in Polish passports images of landmarks that are today within the borders of Ukraine and Lithuania.

Poland's Interior Minister Mariusz Blaszczak said Monday his ministry has picked other images to include in place of the two disputed ones.

The plan had angered both of the neighboring countries, with the Ukrainian government calling it an "unfriendly step."

The disputed images were of a Polish military cemetery in Lviv, Ukraine, and the Gate of Dawn in Vilnius, Lithuania.

The government's proposal appeared to break a longstanding practice of not making any claim, even symbolic, to territories Poland lost in the redrawing of borders during the 20th century.

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