Szydło: no final decision on WWII reparations

In an interview with Gazeta Polska weekly, PM Beata Szydło said that the government has not yet made a final decision whether Poland will seek World War II reparations from Germany. “We were victims of totalitarian German policy during World War II and for decades Poland never received any compensation, while many countries did,” she said. According to Szydło, potential reparations are “a question of elementary justice.” The issue of German reparations resurfaced a few weeks ago, when major Law and Justice (PiS) politicians, including its leader Jarosław Kaczyński started to bring that issue up in the media. In a response, German officials said that the issue was “dealt with conclusively in the past.” In 1953, Polish communist government agreed to forsake any reparations, following Soviet Union suit. That claim was later repeated by a number of Polish governments, including those after the fall of communism, with the most recent claim in 2004, after Poland joined the European Union. “No matter how we consider the matter today, the Polish legal doctrine is inclined to a position that the statement of 1953 is a binding, unilateral act of the state of Poland,” Deputy Foreign Minister Marek Magierowski said a few weeks ago, although he later backtracked saying that “The possibility of seeking reparations claims needs further analysis.”