THE Ukrainian Jewish Committee’s director has harshly criticised a decision by the capital’s legislature to name streets after nazi collaborators.

Eduard Dolinsky said that the Kiev city council ruled on Tuesday to name a city street after Ivan Pavlenko, whom he described as a nazi collaborator and war criminal.

Mr Dolinsky said on Facebook yesterday that Pavlenko led a Ukrainian unit involved in the killing of tens of thousands of Jews during the nazi occupation of Ukraine.

Mr Dolinsky said that the city legislators also named another Kiev street after Nil Khasevich, an activist of the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists, who drew anti-semitic cartoons and was involved in mass killings of Poles during World War II.

Mr Dolinsky described the city council’s move as an insult to Holocaust victims. The Ukrainian authorities had no immediate reaction.