Steinhoff chairs commission to investigate compensation fund dealings

A special commission chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Janusz Steinhoff is to investigate whether the Polish - German Reconciliation Fund made the right decision in accepting zlotys instead of German marks as the currency for the payment of compensation to the former victims of Nazi slave labor. The commission will also decide whether the exchange rate used was fair, and how government representatives being members of the fund's supervisory board affected its decisions. In a statement issued on Friday, the fund said that it had not held any consultations with the cabinet on the currency used or the exchange rate. However, the agreement specifying that the currency accepted would be the zloty and requiring the German side to reach agreement on the exchange rate used for each money transfer was approved by the fund's supervisory board, at a meeting attended by government representatives. (Rzeczpospolita, p. A4) K.K.