Poland looks to Silesia for energy diversification - Krakow Post

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2 The Krakow Post P O L A N D FEBRUARY 7-FEBRUARY 13 R E G I O N A L N E W S Czech WWII wartime hero Jan Paroulek dies Distinguished Czech World War II veteran Jan Paroulek has died in hospital at the age of 85, the CTK agency reported late last week. Paroulek fought in the liberation of Europe after escaping to Britain from France at the start of the war, aged 17. He was later made a Knight of the Legion of Honor by the French state, awarded the Czech medal for heroism and Honored with the promotion to brigadier-general in 2005 for his wartime action. Like many of his counterparts who fought with the western allies, Paroulek was later persecuted by the Communist regime after it gained power in his country in 1948. He was dismissed from the army and was given two prison sentences, one a 12-year punishment, of which he served 10 years, for alleged spying and treason. Paroulek died in hospital in the eastern Czech city of Prerov after a long illness. (AFP) U.S. citizen stabbed to death in Prague suburb: police A 45-year old U.S. citizen was stabbed to death in a Prague suburb late last week, police said. “The man received stab wounds,” Prague police spokesman Ladislav Bernasek told AFP, adding that he died on the spot from his wounds. A 27-year-old man, who has not been identified, was later arrested, he added. Police refused to confirm media reports that the victim was an off duty soldier and the attacker a police officer, apparently drunk on duty. The U.S. embassy said it was checking reports of the incident. (AFP) Russia criticizes Western pressure on Belarus Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov criticized Western countries late last week for putting pressure on Belarus, considered “the last dictatorship in Europe” by the U.S. Meeting his Belarusian counterpart Sergei Martynov in Minsk, Lavrov said that Western diplomatic and economic sanctions against Belarus were “counterproductive and short-sighted.” “We are concerned about the pressure on Belarus from certain Western countries, which is aimed at changing the political system in the republic,” Lavrov said. The U.S. last year blacklisted Belarus’s petrochemical monopoly Belneftekhim and has imposed visa bans against Belarusian leaders. The EU has also set visa bans. Russia is one of the few supporters of authoritarian Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, who has also sought to forge ties with anti-U.S. leaderships in Iran and Venezuela. “Belarus believes that the criticism and unilateral measures of force are unfounded. We are trying to neutralize these issues so that the economic sanctions are removed,” Martynov said. (AFP) Czech president calls EU climate measures tragic mistake Right-wing Czech President Vaclav Klaus slammed the EU’s sweeping new measures to fight climate change as a “tragic mistake” in an interview with a German newspaper late last week. “I believe that our government and others will stand up against these bureaucratic ideas,” Klaus told the Handelsblatt business daily. “This package is without doubt a tragic mistake, a misunderstanding of nature and an unnecessary limitation of human activity,” the outspoken Euroceptic leader added. “For me it is almost a tragedy.” Klaus has previously compared German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s pro-environmental platform to Soviet-era centralized planning and described evidence of global warming as bogus. He said the measures presented by the European Commission would threaten economic growth and limit personal freedom. The energy blueprint is designed to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 20 percent by 2020, compared to 1990 levels, by setting targets for industry. It also stipulates that the use of renewable energies like biomass, wind and solar power have to make up 20 percent of all energy forms by 2020. The EU aims to enact the new measures by the spring of 2009. The Czech Republic is due to hold the rotating EU presidency for the first half of 2009, followed by Sweden. The Czech parliament will next week begin to elect a new president as Klaus’s term expires in March. He faces a challenge from Czech-American professor Jan Svejnar. (AFP) Ukraine grants political asylum to Russian reporter A Russian opposition newspaper journalist, Alexander Kosvintsev, has been granted political asylum in Ukraine, officials said late last week. Kosvintsev will have most rights afforded to Ukraine’s citizens, not including the right to vote, an officer of the state migration service in Lviv region told journalists. Kosvintsev worked as editor in chief at the western Siberian Kemerovo region’s newspaper Rossiyski Reporter and published investigations of corruption and criminal activities involving regional authorities. He applied for asylum in Ukraine in February 2007, claiming to be the victim of intimidation in Russia. The Lviv regional assembly’s chairman Myroslav Senyk pledged to help the reporter, whose articles “made it clear that corrupt Russian authorities decided to punish an independent journalist.” Kosvintsev also worked at Russian opposition newspaper Novaya Gazeta, whose correspondent Anna Politkovskaya, who covered the Chechen conflict and criticized the poor human rights record in the republic, was murdered in October 2006. (AFP) Poland among top EU-supporting nations Daniel Szysz Poland entered the Schengen Zone on Dec. 21. Michal Wojtas staff journalist Poland continues to rank near the top of the EU nations whose citizens are big supporters of the EU. Seventy-one percent of Poles see EU membership as a plus and 62 percent say they trust the EU’s institutions and leadership, according to the latest Eurobarometer survey. It was conducted among citzens of all EU countries between September and November 2007. Only four countries’ citizens show more support for the EU – Luxemburg, with 82 percent; the Netherlands, with 79 percent; Belgium, with 74 percent; and Ireland, with 74 percent. The lowest backing was Britain’s 34 percent. The average level of support for the 27 countries in the EU was 58 percent. Although Poles’ level of trust in the EU remains high, it dropped six percentage points from the 68 percent recorded in early 2007 to the 62 percent seen in the September-November survey. It is still almost double the 33 percent of Poles who said they trusted the EU in 2004, the year Poland joined. agence france-presse Some 50 Ukrainian protesters early this week blocked a crossing point on the border with Poland calling on the Poles to ease visa requirements. The protest took place in the Lviv region in western Ukraine, where the demonstrators blocked the only road serving the Rava-Ruska border crossing, according to a spokeswoman for the regional border guards, Tetiana Guerasimtchuk. Last month there were similar protests along the border by Ukrainians demanding that Kiev and Warsaw sign an accord that would allow border residents to enter Poland without needing a visa. Kiev hopes to conclude such an accord at the end of this month during a visit to Ukraine by Poland’s new prime minister, Donald Tusk. In December Poland joined Europe’s open borders Schengen zone, comprising 22 EU members states plus Iceland and Norway. At the same time, Warsaw made it tougher for Ukrainians to obtain visas. Those living in western Ukraine had been used to traveling to Poland to work and conduct business, often on the black market. Twenty-one percent of Poles in the latest survey said they don’t trust the EU and 11 percent were undecided. Poles’ trust in the EU is much higher than it is in their own governmental institutions. Last autumn only 10 percent said they trust their parliament – a record-low among EU countries. The coalition government of then-Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski didn’t fare much better. Only 17 percent of Poles said they trusted Kaczynski’s Law and Justice Party-led government, which ended up taking a trouncing in elections in late October. Poles also are the EU’s biggest backers of the notion that the EU should continue to be enlarged, with 76 percent voicing support. The average EU score was only 46 percent. Austrians showed the lowest support, 24 percent. Germans were close behind, giving the idea of enlargement only 28 percent support. Poles are becoming more skeptical about making the euro their national currency, however. Only 49 percent support the idea, compared with 54 percent in early 2007. EU citizens’ backing as a whole is 61 percent. The fact that unemployment in Poland has fallen substantially in the last two years has led to Poles listing health care, and not joblessness, as their Number 1 concern. Seventy-four percent listed unemployment as their biggest concern in 2004, 71 percent in 2005 and 68 percent in the fall of 2006. Last fall only 32 percent of Poles listed joblessness as their main concern, however. Health care has become the top concern, with half of the Poles surveyed in the fall of 2007 listing it as their biggest worry. The percentage of Poles who say they are satisfied with their lives remains slightly below the EU average. Seventy-six percent of Poles say they are satisfied, compared with 80 percent EU-wide. The Polish figure is just one percentage point lower than in early 2007. Scandinavians are the happiest EU citizens, with 98 percent of Danes, 96 percent of Swedes and 95 percent of Finns saying they are satisfied with their lives. Norwegians are not in the EU. The lowest satisfaction scores come from new members of the EU. Only 38 percent of Bulgarians are happy, followed by Romanians at 49 percent, Hungarians at 52 percent and Portuguese at 55 percent. Poland, U.S. agree in principle on military cooperation agence france-presse Poland said late last week it has reached an “agreement in principle” with Washington on modernizing its air defenses as part of talks to deploy a controversial U.S. missile shield on Polish territory. Amid concerns about the potential risks of hosting U.S. missile interceptors, Warsaw has been pressing the U.S. to help upgrade the Polish armed forces, and notably to boost the country’s air-defense system. “We are not at the end of the road as regards negotiations,” Poland’s visiting Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said when asked if he had received reassurances about U.S. aid to modernize Polish air defenses. “We’re in the middle of the road. We have an agreement in principle,” Sikorski told a press conference with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. “There is still a great deal of work for our experts,” he added. “And, as I mentioned, the prime minister and the president will approve of whatever is done in the meantime, but yes, I’m satisfied that the principles we have argued for have been accepted,” Sikorski said. Prime Minister Donald Tusk recently demanded extra U.S. security guarantees should Poland host the shield, possibly in the form of a Patriot missile air defense system similar to one already deployed in neighboring NATO-member Germany. In an interview published in Warsaw, Sikorski said Poland wants a bilateral military accord with the U.S. if it agrees to host elements of a U.S. missile shield. He said the accord should be separate from Poland’s affiliation with the U.S. as joint members of NATO. Sikorski told Rzeczpospolita that Poland’s agreement to host the missile shield “depends on the course of negotiations.” Washington and Warsaw are in talks regarding the possible installation of 10 interceptor missile sites in Poland by 2012 to ward off potential attacks by so-called “rogue states,” notably Iran. The plan, which calls for associated radar stations in the Czech Republic, is strongly opposed by Russia. Ukrainians block border crossing with Poland Kyiv, Ukraine.
FEBRUARY 7-FEBRUARY 13 P O L A N D The Krakow Post 3 Dozens charged with corruption at driving school agence france-presse A total 51 driving examiners, instructors and students have been charged with corruption in a criminal probe at a driving school in the western Polish city of Poznan, a prosecutor said late last week. “Via their driving instructors, students gave bribes (to examiners) in exchange for easy-to-pass driving tests,” Poznan district prosecutor Magdalena Mazur-Prus told the Polish PAP news agency. “Bribes were a minimum 700 zloty (195 euro, $285),” she explained. Nearly 100 people have been detained in connection with the probe into wrong-doing at the Poznan-based driving school. Under the Polish criminal code, bribe-taking carries a penalty of up to 10 years behind bars. An EU member since 2004, formerly Communist Poland figures 61st, along with Cuba and Tunisia, on the 2007 corruption perception index (CPI) by corruption watchdog body Transparency International. The index ranks countries based on surveys of perceived levels of corruption. Denmark took top spot in 2007 as the world’s least corrupt state, while at number 179, Somalia was ranked as the globe’s most graft-ridden state. Theologians want to examine Tomasz Weclawski’s writings Prof. Tomasz Weclawski. What’s On? Check out our weekly entertainment listings at: www.krakowpost.com Joanna Zabierek staff journalist Theologians from outside Poznan’s Adam Mickiewicz University will analyze the writings of an influential Roman Catholic priest and Mickiewicz faculty member who left the church without explanation John Marshall staff journalist As reported in The Krakow Post (Dec. 8), Health Minister Ewa Kopacz had announced last November that the government would sponsor a plan to finance in vitro fertilization for infertile Polish couples currently unable to pay for the process. The issue of IVF fertility treatment is hotly debated in Poland. Recently, the highly-influential Polish Church published an open letter in which bishops reiterated the teaching on in vitro fertilization as a sophisticated form of abortion. “Even the strongest desire to have children cannot justify the expense of dozens of other innocent lives,” it argued. With the people, the government and the Church holding sometimes quite differing positions, the government set up a special committee to examine the question in detail. However, in a move that may upset some younger voters, the government later stated that it would not be able to subsidize the procedure, citing the lack of relevant laws under which to redistribute health funds, as announced by Polish Press Agency (PAP) in January. Poland, a European Union member and subject to European law, is in fact currently in breach of several EU directives stipulating that member states ensure the careful monitoring and safety of reproductive cells. It is Poland’s failure to ratify such directives that, according to the Minister, currently disallows the allocation of public funds for IVF treatment. Aware of the financial plight of some of its potential clients, one Polish clinic, InviMedu (in co-operation with Lukas Bank), has begun offering loans to couples, covering 50% of the treatment costs. While the numbers of enquiries for such loans is relatively small at the moment, the introduction of such financial assistance may be crucial for the many Polish couples desperate to have a child through IVF. The government’s citing of the unratified EU directives may be regarded as either coincidence or convenience. What it certainly is not is the end of the debate: Poland’s lack of compliance could eventually lead to it being referred to the European Tribunal of Justice. See IN VITRO on Page 9 last month. The weekly Catholic newspaper Tygodnik Powszechny broke the story of Father Tomasz Weclawski’s departure. He declined to discuss his reasons with the newspaper, but noted that it could find an explanation in his writings. The newspaper found ideas in his writings that could be considered radical. For that reason, theologians will examine his work to make sure it is consistent with church doctrine, according to Pawel Bortkiewicz, dean of theology at Adam Mickiewicz University. Professor Bortkiewicz emphasized that the decision to analyze the writings is neither a witch hunt nor censorship. “It is just about checking if the ideas attributed to Weclawski in the article are real or not, nothing more,” Bortkiewicz added. If the analysis reveals that Weclawski’s writings contradict church teaching, the university will stop recommending them to students, he said. “Of course we are not going to burn them on a pile or move them out of the library,” he said. Tygodnik Powszechny said Weclawski’s writings depicted Christ as a religious reformer and founder of a radical movement who had failed as a faith leader. The leader of the Roman Catholic Church in Poznan, Archbishop Curie, criticized the article, saying it contained many misstatements. He also contended that the magazine’s interpretations of Weclawski’s work were flawed, not reflecting what the priest really said. The theologians who analyze Weclawski’s writings will try to determine if the magazine’s interpretations were correct. Weclawski was born in 1952 in Poznan. In 1973, after two years of studying at a technical university, he began studying at Archbishop Seminary in Poznan. He became a priest in 1979 and obtained a master’s degree in theology a few years later. He was one of a handful of priests who defended Archbishop Juliusz Paetz against accusations that Paetz had sexually abused young priests. The church’s handling of the Paetz matter may have been one of the reasons Weclawski decided to leave the church on Dec. 21, 2007. Weclaski’s decision jolted many Polish Catholics, who had seen Weclawski as a moral and spiritual authority. Respected diplomat Stefan Meller dies aged 65 agence france-presse Stefan Meller, a respected senior diplomat and former foreign minister passed away in Warsaw at the age of 65 after suffering from cancer, his family told AFP early this week. “From 2004 he was fighting cancer. He passed away in a hospital in the evening,” his son, Marcin Meller, said. Born in Lyon, France, in June 1942 to a family of Polish Jews, Meller served as Poland’s foreign affairs minister in the conservative government of Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz between 2005-06. He quit his post after a populist and an extreme-right party entered the government. A historian, Stefan Meller first served in the Foreign Ministry in 1992, in the wake of the 1989 collapse of communism in Poland. Between 1995-96 he served as deputy minister of foreign affairs and later as Poland’s ambassador to Moscow and Paris. His family arrived in France prior to the Holocaust. His grandfather died in a Nazi German concentration camp in Drancy, near Paris. Both a francophone and a francophile, he displayed particular attachment to his French roots, even writing a book about the French Revolution. Having moved to Poland after the war, Meller fell victim to the 1968 anti- Semitic campaign of the then Communist authorities, which saw Polish Jews banned from higher posts. Meller made a living teaching French, after losing his post at the Warsaw University’s international affairs institute. He was able to return to the university in 1974. After the Communist party’s 1981 martial law clamp-down on the fledgling Solidarity freedom movement, Meller regularly wrote for the underground press using a pseudonym. A widower, he is survived by three children. Poland in vitro discussion continues
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Poland looks to Silesia for energy diversification - Krakow Post

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