Open the archives
A series of historic events in recent weeks have caused Polish citizens around the world to take pause and commemorate men, women and children who fell victim to some of the worst atrocities committed in the 20th century. Ten days ago, Polish and Russian officials met in the Katyn forest near Smolensk, Russia, to open a cemetery for the approximately 4,400 Polish officers who were murdered at the site by the NKVD, the Soviet secret police, in the spring of 1940. Wreaths also were placed at memorials in Warsaw last week marking the 56th anniversary of the commencement of the Warsaw uprising.
The first decade after the fall of communism has been as much about initiating a national healing process as it has been about building a young democracy and a free market economic system. These recent historical commemorations are an important part of that process for the country as a whole and for the individuals still impacted by these fateful events.
But these remembrance ceremonies are also part and parcel of the ongoing search for the truth and justice. "The Katyn crime must be fully explained and fully accounted for," said Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek in his speech in the forest. Especially for the 800 family members present at the ceremony, the long overdue opening of the memorial marks the beginning of their own healing process, which was up to now impossible. Mourning of personal losses was subjugated to efforts at getting to the bottom of the truth long camouflaged by a curtain of mendacity and manipulation.
Until the 1990s historical truth was outside the realm of the average citizen. As a precious commodity, evidence about the nation's past was guarded jealously by the most cynical of caretakers. As Katyn proves, in this decade since the fall of communism, ordinary Poles have only begun to discover the truths about events that shaped their lives and that of their country for much of the last century. Unfortunately, political events in recent weeks show that history remains a powerful political currency even in today's democratic Poland and is still out of reach of average Poles. A case in point is the recent information regarding presidential candidates Lech Walesa and Aleksander Kwasniewski. In the countdown to the upcoming presidential elections, information leaking out of the screening court over the last two weeks suggests that the two leaders both cooperated with the communist secret service. While it is good for the electorate to know the truth about the political background of its leaders, the lack of transparency in the unveiling process raises more suspicions than it lends a sense of closure.
At the bottom of all this is that just as in communist times, the archives continue to be guarded by jealous gatekeepers. The information about Poland's recent past is still filtered and incomplete. It's time for the caretakers to throw away the keys and let Poles in.
