Posted on 02/17/2005 4:31:06 PM PST by se99tp
Journalist terminated from job, historian facing 3 years of jail and procommunist paper full of hatred to Polish patriots-anticommunists
Keep that flame burning for Polish freedom
Some portay it as opening Pandora's box but actually it is like rubbing Alladin's lamp. It was a lamp brought by a group of brave Polish historians of the National Institute of Remembrance where there are secretpolice files. Recently one journalist dared to passe the mysteries of the lamp to the Polish people.The National Institute of Remembrance (INR), created according toParliament legislature, is discovering communist's dirty secrets andrewriting Polish history. They are under constant attack of communists who changed their name into Social Democrats and the so called Union of Freedom.
Every year enemies of INR are trying to belittle its budget. -Forget past and look into to future - a slogan used in their electoralcampaigns cannot more clearly explain their intenstions. Their mission? To erase recent history and burn secret police files. In contrast, the INRgoal is to confront people with their past. It is a process ofdecomunization. That process of confrontation is very slow since INR lacks funding and understanding of political elites.
Enemies of decomunization have had their past victories. By manipulingfacts and escalating a campaign of fear, postcommunists prevented theexposure of the communists secret police agents in 1992, which in turnforced the then conservative government to resign. Since then, there has been a forced deadly silence.
A few weeks ago, one brave journalist copied the catalogue of the archivesof INR, a document containing more than 150,000 names. This secret list of names are those individuals processed by the communist secret police. To authenticate these documents, the catologue numbers of the files, and, most important, even information about the type of files were provided.There are personal files of officers, files of cooperatives of the secretpolice and candidates for cooperatives and microfilms which containsinformation about cooperatives.
Along with that data, there is even documentation about where those files were created. i.e. SWSW(abbreviaton of Polish name for Office of Secret Police in Capital ).
" I would help that journalist if I only could - says prof Jan Zaryn of INR. This is a unique chance for Poland to deal finally with it'scommunist past."However along with campaign for truth another campaign started. Enemies ofdecomunization falsely informed Polish public opinion about thepublication of the list from INR archives.
One procommunist paperdistorted facts saying that this list is a "list of communist agents". It was a clear signal to attack for other media infiltrated by communists.Eventually, a journalist who publicized the list was fired from thepopular daily newspaper, Rzeczpospolita. Said the Editor in Chief of theRzeczpospolita, Grzegorz Guaden, ...(this journalist) became a politician instead of remaining a journalist."
But many believe the scape-goated journalist expressed the will of the majority of Polish people, who are dissappointed with the results achievedby Poland in this past decade. Poland is torn by scandals concerning theinappropriate use of power by the Social Democratic Party, and allegedpersonal financial gains by some politicians. Currently, there is aspecial committee in Parliament investigating top Polish politicians;including the President and Prime Minister."Seeing all that scandal, most Poles believe politicians are corrupted androtten to the bone," says a former cabinet member of the Ronald ReaganAdministration. He adds that journalist should be awarded for his act, notterminated from employment.
Polish Communist authorities have a different opinion, and they have launched an investigation to prove that the fired journalist broke the law. And, Enemies of decommunization have the advantage. Their columnistsand editors dictate public opionions which are being considered by the highest authorities. In the name of tolerance and even christian forgiveness they try to cover the past.
"First the files of the secret police must be open, then agents must beexposed, denied taking highest post in Polish society and only then beforgiven - says prof John Lenczowski the director of the Institute of World Politics in Washington and the former National Security Council Advisor in Reagan Administration.
Without a doubt, the process of decommunization demands support fromWestern public opinion. And that support is desperately needed now.
mg, pt
What's this anonymoussierra?
Portion of the article
Shadow of the Files
By Anne Applebaum
Wednesday, February 16, 2005; Page A19
WARSAW -- For the past 15 years, every time I've returned to Warsaw -- a city I first saw shrouded in the gloom of martial law -- I've been surprised anew by the scale of the changes. Every year there are more new buildings and more small businesses. Every year the middle class seems larger, and the once-vast gap between the average Pole and the average European seems smaller. Last week was no exception. While I was there, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was also in Warsaw, while the Polish president, Aleksander Kwasniewski, was in Washington -- and nobody made a fuss about either visit. Business as usual, in other words, in an ex-communist country that is now an active member of NATO and the European Union.
Yet not everything has changed. Quite by accident, my visit to Warsaw also coincided with the unexpectedly fierce renewal of a debate that last gripped the country a decade ago. At stake was a list of actual and potential secret police informers, preserved intact from the communist era, discovered in an archive, electronically copied by a journalist, and then somehow posted, in an unverifiable form, on the Internet. Since it appeared the country has been convulsed by an intense, déjà vu frenzy. One acquaintance told me that she walked into her office the morning after the story broke and found everyone silently scanning the list with their doors shut, looking for the names of friends, neighbors or themselves. The list was the most sought-after item on Polish Google. On the day I visited, crowds of people were standing outside the Institute of National Memory, where the files are kept, clamoring to see their files.
The Communists were never punished. There was no "Nuremburg Trials" equivalent, and certainly no gallows. Instead, the Eichmanns and Goerings of the Soviet Bloc are now the "reformed Communists" - still in power! What is wrong with this picture?
Przeklete komunisty
Niektore czlonki mojej rodziny sa la liscie Wildsteina. A wasze?
Ah ~ those skeletons in the closet.
Moze byc wiele osob o podobnym nazwisku w Polsce.
O niektorych jestem dosic pewny, nie tylko bo byli na liscie.
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