From Mazowiecki to Tusk: The Solidarity of Europe’s Christian Democrats with the People of Poland

Jürgen Wahl

From Mazowiecki to Tusk The Solidarity of Europe’s Christian Democrats with the People of Poland

Jürgen Wahl From Mazowiecki to Tusk The Solidarity of Europe’s Christian Democrats with the People of Poland

© „Bouvier”, Bonn 2010 © Wydawnictwo „Wokó³ nas”, 2012

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The publication was funded by the Centre for European Studies

ISBN: 978-83-88199-19-6

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Contents Jacques Santer: Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Wilfried Martens: Opening words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Joseph Daul: Opening words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Europe – vision and reality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Poland after the First World War – from chaos to democracy . . . . . . 19 Europe after 1945 – bridges blown up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 Four phases in EPP’s efforts to build bridges with Poland . . . . . . . . . 30 The travels of Dr. Egon A. Klepsch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 When the Iron Curtain began to rust . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 Through a door called “Dziekania” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Mid-term review – under time pressure on the road to Kaczyñski’s “collective party” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101 Thinking back to the beginning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109 Positions after the split from the Kaczyñski group . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124 The return to power of the Polish united left (SLD) . . . . . . . . . . . . 127 Civic Platform (PO) and People’s Party (PSL) as partners . . . . . . . . 136 In a minefield: Catholic versus “Catholic” groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 Europe’s Social Democrats before 1989 – the cold shoulder for Poland . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 History of the European People’s Party and its predecessors . . . . . . 160 The Christian Democrats’ Robert Schuman Foundation . . . . . . . . . . 179 The Kraków conferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 Reflections on Europe: Karl Josef Hahn, W³adys³aw Bartoszewski, Erhard Busek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 Poland on the EPP agenda – a few key facts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202 Index of names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205

Foreword Jacques Santer, President of the Robert Schuman Foundation, Luxembourg When the European Council was founded in 1949, Robert Schuman, a top-ranking politician and later both Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of France, said that Europe, which was beginning to grow together, would “be incomplete” without Poland, not to mention Czechoslovakia (as it was then known), Hungary and the other countries. The belief held by some that “the West” did not care about the nations ruled by Moscow at that time is therefore clearly not founded in reality.

Europe’s Christian Democrats were particularly interested in Poland right after the Second World War. After all, this country had been the first victim of Hitler’s war. It had lost several million people, including as a result of Soviet aggression. After 1945, Poland found itself behind the “Iron Curtain”, and once again became the victim of a dictatorship.

Time and again, the Polish people rose up against their oppressors, and were finally successful in 1980 with the “Solidarity” liberation movement. From the very beginning, Europe’s Christian Democrats and their Robert Schuman Foundation provided Poland’s democrats with both political and material support.

In this book, Jürgen Wahl – who has reported on Poland since 1969 – sets out to describe for the first time the extent of Christian Democrat involvement in Poland. He reveals a number of previously unknown facts and also refutes a few myths.

As a Luxembourgian, I am particularly glad to see the new Poland joining in the construction of Europe in the spirit of Robert Schuman.

I would like to wish this book, which is supported by the Robert Schuman Foundation, much success.

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Opening words Wilfried Martens, Chairman of the European People’s Party One of the key features of Christian Democracy in Western Europe between 1945 and 1989 was our refusal to accept a divided Europe. We never accepted that our brothers and sisters in Central and Eastern Europe should be robbed for decades of their freedom and independence by the totalitarian rule of Communist parties. It is therefore not surprising that we sought to make contact with like-minded people on the other side of the Iron Curtain right at beginning of the Cold War. Poland was always a particular focus of our efforts, not only because of its size, but also because of its deep-rooted Catholicism and, linked to this, its strong anti-communist movements, which were evident from the very beginning.

A few members and leading politicians of the European People’s Party often met with Polish democrats, some of whom were in exile, some of whom were members of opposition groups in Poland and some of whom were underground. After 1989, this contact intensified rapidly.

It became clear that not only would many Polish democrats and several of their parties fit into the political spectrum of the EPP very well, but that Poland and its neighbouring countries should join NATO and the EU, the main Euro-Atlantic institutions, as quickly as possible. These steps would have been much more difficult had it not been for the years of personal contact between many Western European Christian Democrats and their friends in Poland.

The roundtable talks of 1989 brought fundamental change to the political landscape in Poland. Parliamentary elections followed, which resulted in a democratic government led by Tadeusz Mazowiecki, who was one of the leaders of the Solidarity movement and the first non-communist prime minister in Central Europe since the Second World War. Not only did the developments in Poland lead to the gradual collapse of the whole Eastern Bloc, they also determined the speed of the collapse, and the Yalta System became confined to history.

Lech Wa³êsa was elected president of the Republic of Poland on 9 December 1990. I received him in Brussels on 1 July 1991, by which point he had already touched on his country’s future membership of the European Union. In 1997, Jerzy Buzek was elected prime minister, first as the head of the coalition between Solidarity Electoral Action (AWS) and Freedom Union (UW) until 2001, then briefly as head of an AWS minority government. Despite implementing important policy reforms in the areas of ed5

ucation, pensions and decentralisation, his coalition lost. However, Buzek did not give up. In 2004, he was elected to the European Parliament. He received 173,389 votes, a Polish record, based entirely on his own personal popularity and his direct contact with the voters.

In October 2005, Lech Kaczyñski of the Law and Justice Party (PiS) was elected president shortly after his brother Jaros³aw became prime minister. Two years later, in the parliamentary elections of October 2007, PiS was replaced by the EPP member parties Civic Platform (PO) and the Polish People’s Party (PSL). PO chairman Donald Tusk became prime minister and formed a convincing government together with PSL chairman Waldemar Pawlak. Donald Tusk was a co-founder of Civic Platform and had been chairman of the party since June 2003. He received 534,000 votes in the 2007 elections, the best individual result in the history of the Third Republic. Donald Tusk represents a new Poland, one which embodies the most important Western values. It was on the strength of these ideals that he was able to win over the younger generation of his country in a remarkable election campaign.

In this highly informative book, Jürgen Wahl – himself heavily involved in establishing contacts with Poland right from the start – provides important insights into the solidarity of Western European Christian Democrats with their Polish counterparts. He invites comment from several players on both sides. This is one of very few attempts to properly document this particular chapter in the history of relations between Eastern and Western Europe. I would like to congratulate Jürgen Wahl and everyone else who has helped make this book so successful.

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Opening words Joseph Daul, President of the European People’s Party Group (Christian Democrats) in the European Parliament As chairman of the EPP Group in the European Parliament, I consider the expansion of the European Union and the consequent inclusion and integration of delegates from the centre parties of the new EU member states to be particular milestones in our recent history.

As the largest of these countries, Poland enjoyed the complete support of the Group in order to strengthen both its democracy and economic vitality. The EPP Group had already established close contacts with leading politicians from democratic Poland and invited them to join the Group even before the radical changes of 1989-1990.

The Group spent numerous days studying and considering the expansion of the Union. In February 1998, the Group presidency met in Warsaw to make real progress in preparing Polish civil society for change, as well as to further intensify contacts between Polish and European Christian Democrats.

The EPP Group had substantial influence on the accession debate, not least thanks to the politics of numerous Polish representatives sympathetic to the EPP, in particular former Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek. It therefore gives me particular pleasure that Jerzy Buzek was elected president of the European Parliament in July 2009.

On a simpler and yet powerfully symbolic level, my home region of Alsace soon realised that it too could contribute to the great adventure of reconciliation between the nations. It understood the importance of building bridges with the regions of Poland.

The region of Alsace is now working with Lower Silesia to develop numerous management training, economic development and cultural exchange projects there. The General Council of the Lower Rhine region is working with the Silesia Province and the General Council of the Upper Rhine region is cooperating with the WrocÂław region.

Allow me to illustrate this with an example of one of the many joint projects, some of which I have visited: the Chamber of Agriculture is providing support for the creation of modern structures to represent the profession, advising farmers, and helping train their chosen representatives and administrators.

In the early 1990s, we had the pleasure of presenting these numerous initiatives that reflect the solidarity between the European regions at an exhibition at the European Parliament in Strasbourg. This led to the creation of strong bonds of friendship.

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I would also like to pay tribute to the work of J端rgen Wahl. His work is a valuable testimony to that important time in history when Poland regained democracy and took its place in the great European project.

I would like to both thank him and congratulate him on his book.

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Europe – vision and reality For Robert Schuman, European vision and European reality went largely hand-in-hand. Sixty years ago, on 9 May 1950, when Schuman, speaking as France’s foreign minister, announced his famous plan for establishing a “European Union of Coal and Steel”, millions of post-war Europeans agreed that only by quasi-revolutionary, cooperative efforts could they relieve day-to-day poverty, put an end to the Soviet threat and consolidate the partnership with the United States. The citizens Robert Schuman of France and Germany, in particular, still remembered the mistakes made by politicians in 1918, when they failed to bring about peaceful unity among nations, to overcome hatred and the “victor” mentality, and to strengthen the economy through joint efforts rather than weakening it through national egotism.

Robert Schuman, born in Luxembourg and brought up bilingually on the French border with Germany, was the perfect mediator in the rubble field that was Europe in 1950, still characterised by traces of war. He met Konrad Adenauer in Bonn and Alcide De Gasperi in Rome, both of whom were also “border citizens” and shared his beliefs on cooperation and reconciliation with neighbours. Adenauer came from Cologne on the Rhine, De Gasperi from Trento, close to German-speaking regions.

The main outcome of the Schuman plan, which emerged from the vision, was work; and the cooperation among the six European countries that set up the European Coal and Steel Community led to prosperity, which attracted both admiration and envy. As early as 1957, European integration reached a new level: the Treaties of Rome secured the first, as yet incomplete, economic community.

For many years, the movement for “ever closer cooperation” between countries, secured by treaties, was led by the Christian Democrat parties in free Europe. However, it became clear as a result of this that there could be no agreement regarding integration. Although Social Democrats, Liberals and later the environmental parties (“Greens”) proved that they were capable of extensive cooperation, particularly in the European Parliament, those political powers that had never truly said farewell to the old-style nation state also regained strength.

Step by step, the European Parliament changed its appearance. The differences between supporters and opponents of integration became more important than the differences of opinion between “families of parties” in the centre-right and centre-left of the House. At the same time, participation in global politics also increased. Thus the Parliament

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could boast of speaking out more unequivocally on human rights than the United Nations.

When the Soviet Empire finally collapsed in the years after 1988, the picture that emerged was surprising: too few politicians were prepared to recognise that the fall of communism was also particularly linked to the economic and political union of Europe, not to mention Western joint security policy.

As a joint centre party with Christian Democratic foundations, it was not surprising that the European People’s Party suffered as a result of the “dilution” of the vision of 1950 — not in its internal political development, but in the way it came to be perceived by the media and thus by a majority of ordinary citizens. Unfortunately, surveys carried out in most EU countries have confirmed our analysis.

Because the style of national European politics has changed in most EU countries since the fall of communism, and the public is more interested in rivalry than common ground, the EPP, like other “transnational parties”, has had fewer opportunities than earlier in its 25-year history to impress its achievements on the public. So far, this negative trend has yet to be stopped.

One of the consequences of this new situation is the fact that all the efforts of the EPP and its member parties to “build bridges” with the East have gone almost unrecognised. These efforts on the part of the EPP concerned all eight of the former Communist-ruled states that joined the EU in 2004. This book describes efforts to build bridges with Poland, an important but difficult task.

In order to clarify again the extent of the differences between the visions of the Schuman era and publicised reality, I shall begin by considering the encouraging election of Jerzy Buzek to the position of president of the European Parliament. What this shows is that the continued economic success of the EU and in particular the introduction of the euro are, sadly, very different from the relationship of most media to their own users. In other words, whereas it was comparatively easy for Robert Schuman’s contemporaries to trace and understand the benefits of an integrated Europe in newspapers and the radio, this is more difficult today, not only because of the ever more complicated “Brussels relationships”, but also because of the way today’s media, in particular television, deal with the EU and the relationship between Brussels and nation states.

It is my hope that this book will make it easier for readers to be able to assess the achievements of Europe’s Christian Democrats, taking Poland as an example.

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Who invented Jerzy Buzek?

When Jerzy Buzek stood for election for president of the European Parliament in summer 2009, the Polish delegate and his friends in Strasbourg knew that the decisive role in his political rise was the transnational European People’s Party (EPP), not national governments, including that of Poland. Contact had been Jerzy Buzek made with Buzek many years before Poland joined the EU, thanks to the EPP’s advances into the newly selfliberated parts of Europe, at the heart of which lay Poland. Because Buzek was the first prime minister of the Third Republic of Poland to serve a full term, he also attracted the attention of the EPP community and received their delegates in Warsaw.

Nevertheless, nearly all the influential media in the EU, including in Poland and Germany, were spreading the same old nonsense in 2009: it was claimed that the highest representatives of national governments had pulled strings for Buzek and that he was “their” candidate. The reason for this is the false belief held by many of those behind the media that it is not political parties that are responsible for Europe’s advancement, not even “transnational” parties like the EPP, but the usual politicians at the top of national power centres. The thinking of many editorial teams seems to be, “We know what they’re like”, and that is sufficient for the production of news stories. Therefore, German television viewers see faces from Berlin rather than Strasbourg, for example, and the same goes for the Poles; Warsaw takes precedence over Brussels.

In May 2010, EU countries relapsed into fearful nationalist feelings and foolish memories of sovereignties of long-ago. At the presentation of the Charlemagne Prize to Donald Tusk in Aachen (13 May 2010), both Tusk and Angela Merkel confronted this growing pessimism and the intentional spreading of rumours.

Many media outlets continued their false and misleading accounts of trends in European politics even after the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty. Similarly, even proposals put forward by the European Commission have been depicted as basically pre-planned and pre-approved. But is this misinformation intentional, or just a matter of incompetence?

Many newspapers would graciously write, for example, that members of the European Parliament only had to “pass” plan XYZ of the Commission. This wording sounds more like an automatic “wave through” than a process of deliberation, and unfortunately that is often intentional. The public rarely finds out that almost 100% of European policies now require final approval in Parliament, and that both the Commission and the Coun11

cil suffer defeats, sometimes resulting in the complete rejection of Commission proposals.

As the old, core states of the EU know, it can take decades for people to understand that decision-making at the national level is increasingly being discarded within the EU, as well as how this is happening. It does not happen at lightning speed, but conflict by conflict, over the course of long-drawn-out learning periods. That was why Joseph Daul, the French EPP Group Chairman, said ironically of his Polish colleague Buzek’s candidacy, “It was simply time for someone from the countries that joined us in 2004” (meaning that they were “of course” entitled). This was why, after consultation, the Group voted almost unanimously for Buzek, thereby demonstrating to some extent how the Parliament, 30 years after its inception, continues to grow stronger with every election.

No progress without knowledge of the past Why am I now offering the reader an introduction to the history of the EPP’s bridge-building in Eastern Europe, in particular in Poland, in the years before and after 1989, not to mention a few brief glimpses of prewar times? Firstly, because the problems of Europe are rooted in pre-war times. Secondly, bridge-building with Poland, as modelled by the EPP, has not yet been sufficiently recognised as successful “transnational politics” as practised by a political party, which is fundamentally different from the customary way of proceeding on “foreign territory”, namely through the spirit of European solidarity.

Average citizens informed by newspapers and television were barely aware of completely new policies which were worked out in Brussels, 90% of which were developed using informal processes. At the same time, the percentage of foreign ministers and European politicians in national parliaments decreased in most EU states. But enough complaining! The following text by Czes³aw Mi³osz shows that many problems of perception, to which I will return later, have long existed.

CZES£AW MI£OSZ Born in Szetejnie (Lithuania) in 1911, a Polish emigrant between 1951 and 1989, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957, died in Krakow in 2004, an honorary member of Solidarity.

The Captive Mind (about controlled communist “culture”), 1953 in Paris.

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From a speech given by Mi³osz in 1957: “If you were to ask a resident of the state of Idaho today to name some European countries, he would undoubtedly mention France, Holland, Italy and Germany. His knowledge would not extend any farther east, and the people that live there seem to him a mixture of uninteresting, backward tribes. Perhaps this test subject is suffering from a “historical time-lag”; in other words, his consciousness is giving in to old-fashioned ways of thinking, which contradict reality. Nevertheless, the views of this citizen of Idaho should still be taken seriously. They have influenced the decisions of American politicians, for whom the loss of the European ‘Ostmark’ to Russia did not seem much of a price to pay. *** Western Europe has amassed money and power throughout history, which has led to the creation of cultural models which were later copied in the East. There are churches and palaces in Poland that were built by Italian architects, for example; Polish landscape painting was influenced by Baroque painting; Polish poets liked to imitate French verse forms, etc. The countries of Central and Eastern Europe were ‘poor relations’ and lived in a kind of colonial territory. The West treated them with not a little patronising disdain, and was in this respect not too unlike the resident of Idaho with his all-too simplified views.”

The difficulties of bridge-building One direct consequence of this was that even Europeans struggled to understand the determined attempts of the EPP and EPP delegates to attract Polish partners after 1989. They misjudged their actions because of old ways of thinking, and weighed them and interpreted them on a national level once they had been successful. I must therefore explain why this was, and sometimes still is, the case. One aspect that was and still remains key is expert knowledge of the actual conditions under which the bridge-building exercise was planned, tested, continued, occasionally abandoned, and finally completed successfully. Thank God, it rarely went backwards; nonetheless, it did not go forwards as quickly as industry and the banks had hoped, or as quickly as they themselves progressed.

One thing that is becoming increasingly clear is that, although the memory of 1945 remains important and justified, it is also important and justified to consider the development of political parties in Poland since the end of the 19th century. One should also know how some Western parties viewed Poland at that time. I shall also provide a description of the situation in Europe between 1918 and 1939. These relatively brief glances at history should help us analyse the situation after 1945.

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A true and oft-cited fact is that the European misery of 1945, which affected both the victors and the vanquished, helped Robert Schuman and other Christian Democrats to find new ways of thinking more quickly and more easily; however, once poverty had been overcome, and in particular after the end of the Cold War, it became clear that the “ghosts and serpents of yesterday” (Helmut Kohl) were still in existence and were turning up in new guises. In 2009, constitutional judges in Germany even decided that Europe was already sufficiently integrated. In 2010, the financial crisis in Greece quickly proved the opposite.

I will not go into history in too much detail. It just needs to be clear how difficult it has been for the concept of a united Europe when millions of people have, even innocently, clung to old-fashioned ways of thinking.

To be sure, after 1945 not many were still preaching the misguided principles of the nation states of old; after all, Stalin and Hitler had “taken over” some of these states, reshaped them and, ultimately, encased them in concrete or destroyed them – at first with words of peace, but in the end with war. Out of nationalistic rhetoric emerged fields of rubble, with only a few memorials to commemorate what happened. Here, both the old ghosts, as well as the heroes, of Europe’s past live on.

When, in the second half of the 19th century, the first democratic parties emerged in Poland, Germany and Austria, noteworthy here because they border the regions of Central and Eastern Europe, Europe was nothing more than a geographic label, which was itself a subject of debate.

Charles de Gaulle went so far as to say that Europe extended “only as far as the Urals”, and this he meant politically.

I have described the party-political roots of the European idea in the chapter “The History of the European People’s Party” (from page 160), as well as some of the ideas of the Christian parties, which were often made up solely of Catholics. I would like to emphasise here that the early “Christian-inspired” parties could only think internationally in one way, if at all. This is because they were taught that Catholic belief does not stop at national borders, and that they should therefore remain loyal to the Pope in Rome. In turn, the social doctrines of Pope Leo XIII and his successors provided political impulses that had a major impact.

There was only one other political power that attached importance to doing business at an international level: the left-wing labour movement of socialists or communists, who also wanted to cross all state borders, not for pious reasons, of course, but because of their belief in the prospect of an international revolution. Many Western European Social Democrats were less focused on revolution: the German SPD, for example, had called for a “United States of Europe” as early as 1925. It is interesting to note that after 1945, the Free Democratic successors of Europe’s Christian and Socialist parties came to believe that they could cooperate concerning the 14

integration of Europe, albeit in different ways. The international experiences of both movements soon had a positive effect.

Today’s younger generation knows even less than the “1945ers” about these and other roots of European politics, and that is perfectly natural.

They do not know, for example, that the new vision of Europe held by many democrats came about during the Second War World, not least in prisons and labour camps. This idea was largely non-partisan. Unfortunately, the first generation after Adenauer and Schuman already lost sight of some of the goals envisioned at that time. Charles de Gaulle might have had „European visions”, but he did not have any fruitful federative plans like Robert Schuman or Alcide De Gasperi.

After de Gaulle’s death in 1969, national turmoil in Western Europe returned quite quickly, accompanied by growing anti-American tendencies. It is clear today that not only did alienation from the United States weaken the integration of Europe, it also revived nationalist tendencies, and not only in Britain. It was all too clear that by thus distancing itself from the spirit of 1945-50, Europe was also ensuring the continuation of the red domination of Eastern Europe. Unfortunately, this stance was accepted by many new left-wingers. In 1970, Franco-opponent Salvador de Maderiaga spoke of a “new kind of cowardice”.

The sobering conclusion is that, after 1945, nothing ensured the lasting success of the integration of Europe as much as the Cold War, which continued immediately after overcoming the first wave of material poverty, and which became a burning topic in 1950 with the outbreak of the Korean War. It culminated in the nuclear arms race and eventually in the communist separation, which ended in the construction of the Berlin Wall and the fixed demarcation of the entire German Democratic Republic (East Germany) in 1961. Behind their walls, the communists of Poland and other states were soon left out in the cold, quite unexpectedly. They were faced with more and more shortages of all kinds. The “reforms”, including those conceived in Warsaw, failed. No other country in Eastern Europe had so many jokes about the economy.

Unfortunately, some Western politicians saw, or wanted to see, the post-1961 chaos as the beginning of a new type of “coexistence”. They had to completely change their ideas, while the Christian Democrats in the EPP did not have to do this. They knew the saying of Polish writer Jerzy Lec about people who wanted to be “ahead of their time” and then had to wait in cold railway stations until their time came.

During this period, Western awareness of Poland, which had already been quite limited, decreased year by year, as did of course fundamental knowledge about other communist-ruled countries. Chapters on Poland and Polish history were abridged in school textbooks in many Western European countries. All that remained were distorted snapshots of a Poland that was technically harder to reach than New York. Nevertheless, 15

those responsible for the stultification process in German and Western European schools did not feel guilty. As a young lawyer and member of the German Bundestag said of Poland in 1963, “The Kremlin might be in power for more than a hundred years.” At the time, it was more important to know about Morocco than to know about Poland.

The evaporation of knowledge about Poland was particularly damaging for “old” Europe, because with it also disappeared all memory of the historically most important land between Prussia, Russia and Austria since the Middle Ages. By 1998, some 80% of Germans under 60 did not know about Poland’s division among three “neighbours” for nearly 150 years prior to 1918. However, the Irish, the Portuguese and the Greeks were also unable to answer similar questions.

Democracy had a slim chance in Poland for a short period prior to 1914. Catholic social parties emerged in industrialised parts of the west and the south in particular, thanks to the papal social encyclicals, beginning with Leo XIII. On the one hand, these parties wanted to fight for humane working conditions; on the other, they were interested in defending cultural rights. Similar orientations were popular in Galicia, where Austria ruled, albeit with less of an iron fist than did Russia and Prussia. Catholic workers’ associations and the first Christian trade unions came into being at the same time. The fact that the Polish, Austrian and German organisations all resembled each other was due to the influence of the Vatican.

Organisations representing the interests of farmers began to spring up around the same time in Poland, including – unlike in Western Europe – those with left-wing policies. Farm workers organised themselves against landowners, an occurrence which was rare in Germany and Austria, although it did happen in parts of Italy. There were therefore clear similarities to the formation of social fronts in Sicily and Galicia. Many priests helped small farmers in both countries.

The history of the EPP shows that the first “Christian” party was founded in Sicily in 1919 by the priest Don Sturzo, who joined with poor farmers to demonstrate against rich landowners. And since 1980, Western friends of Poland have noticed that many members of the high-ranking Polish clergy started off as worker-priests and industrial chaplains, including Cardinal Primate Stefan Wyszyñski and Pope John Paul II. Another factor that separated Western and Eastern worker-priests was their different understanding of the nation state. Don Sturzo did not live in a divided Italy and therefore did not have much reason for fiery national loyalty, less at least than his Don Luigi Sturzo 16

colleagues in Poland, who had stood by the Polish people and nation for generations, and who had to still stand by them, so that their homeland was not destroyed by division or weakened through strife. Whereas Don Sturzo’s father had experienced the unification of Italy in 1861, Poland had to wait another 50 years for its own rebirth.

Why was so little known in Western Europe about the few old roots of Polish-Christian politics after 1945? Because after the division of Germany (1948), most Western Christian churches (with the exception of a few Protestant churches) were on the Western political side during the “Cold War”, although they had no desire for endless ideological confrontations.

Speaking in 1946, Churchill, who always used vivid imagery in his speeches, said that countries like Poland had “disappeared behind a sort of iron curtain”. Not hidden, simply gone, and therefore invisible to the West.

This even applied to the Germans, since Moscow had cemented the GDR, which neither Warsaw nor Bonn esteemed, between Poland and West Germany. West Germans travelling to Poland were therefore advised at the time to fly rather than travel overland.

During the Cold War, not only did news from Poland and the Eastern bloc countries dry up with each passing year, so did feelings and memories. One should not gloss over this fact today, even if some people from the West who made an above-average effort came away with different, even positive, perceptions. Such perceptions may even have been discussed, albeit rarely. I will return later to the behaviour of Germans who fled or were driven out of Poland.

It should never be forgotten that there was a broad front of people in Europe who stood by the Christians “in the East” both materially and in prayer, but who nevertheless had scant knowledge of the real lives of the people who lived between Riga and Sofia, barricaded in as they were at the Elbe, with the help of the GDR regime. Few people have stressed the charitable work of the West Europeans as much as Pope John Paul II. There was increasing talk at the time from the type of optimists who believed in human progress through the easing of economic relations.

They saw successes, financial of course, but trader privileges did not extend to free travel for “ordinary people”. In any case, incitement continued in the schools of Eastern Europe.

It should therefore surprise no one that, after 1945, even the few Western Christian Democrats who were really interested in building bridges with Poland had the feeling that they were starting from scratch. There were a lot of things they did not understand. And how could an ordinary citizen from Cologne, Rotterdam or Milan have learnt anything prior to the Solidarity era? How indeed …

For a long time there were still major differences between Poland and other communist countries within the Soviet sphere of influence: many Poles were allowed to study in the West, more so than GDR Germans or 17

Latvians or Czechs, and Poland made even more use of this after 1989, which was encouraging.

Another unusual fact was that, after Stalin’s death in 1953, nowhere was political deviation tolerated in such a de facto fashion, or “overlooked by the police”, than in Poland and (after 1956) Hungary, compared with the GDR and the CSSR. This continued to be the case. Only after 13 December 1981 was this process reversed for a while, but even this did not help those in government.

Poland’s agriculture was not subject to total communisation after 1944/ 45, which was an exception in the “bloc”. Apparently the Soviets did not dare to collectivise Poland’s agriculture. The consequences of this relative prosperity irritated the EU before Poland’s accession, but then the existing conditions made it easier for “Brussels” to classify Polish agriculture into segments which needed support and those which did not. The web of lies and statistics constructed by the old Polish communist agrarian party, the ZSL, broke apart. Many Western Christian Democrats helped with this, in particular Austrians.

Although the church in Poland withstood the confrontation with power better than its counterparts in neighbouring communist-ruled states, the battle did lead to the (early) imprisonment of the Cardinal Primate, and later to costly and foolish moves to bring about division within the church. All in all, the resistance of the Polish church became known around the world. Even the EPP did not find out until after the fall of communism what was really heroic about the resistance and what was just a shining façade.

As Pope Paul VI said, the “only living Catholic university between Leuven and Tokyo” was in Lublin in Poland. There was no pretence about the Catholic University of Lublin: it was effective and it provided immunisation. The German Christian Democrats and the Konrad Adenauer Foundation established contacts with Lublin long before the fall of communism, from which both the EPP and the EPP Group benefited later on.

Christian Democrats from Italy, Germany, Holland and Austria also spoke at CUL prior to the fall of Communism.

In short, when Europe’s Christian Democrats first began to build bridges with potential partners in Poland, a few political emphases had already been laid, oriented towards the special conditions in Poland. Nevertheless, bridges need solid ramps on both banks. I will therefore now describe in brief how political conditions developed in Poland after the First World War, at the time of the Second Polish Republic. I will focus only on that which is relevant to the time between 1945 and 2004, when Poland joined the European Union.

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Poland after the First World War – from chaos to democracy Let us begin by reading a few abridged chapters by Adam Krzemiñski, whom we have to thank for one of the best accounts of recent Polish history.

Poland 1919 – The country was financially ruined after the front had passed through several times. Some 60% of its industry was at a standstill and the factories were empty, after first the Russians and then the Germans had removed all of the machinery. In the Russian zone, the railway had lost 80% of its rolling stock; 60% of railway stations and 50% of bridges had been destroyed. In Galicia, the yield per acre had fallen by over 50%, as had livestock numbers. Only the province of Posen remained intact; however, firstly, it did not yet belong to Poland, and secondly, even it had failed to reach one third of 1913 production levels.

The people were still living in a state of political uncertainty and economic poverty. And yet the three regions, which had for several generations been Russified or Germanised and which had all been incorporated into “incompatible” economic and political organisms, were soon to become united. This was not inevitable, especially when one considers that the difference in development between Posen and eastern Poland (today part of Belarus and Ukraine) was greater than that between Germany and Poland today.

In January 1919, the country held elections to the Sejm, from which the centre right parties emerged as the strongest faction. Pi³sudski, who was still considered a socialist, was nevertheless confirmed as head of state, and the Moraczewski government was able to introduce left-wing reforms without objection, since they lessened the destructive power of the revolutionary impetus of that time. State institutions were quickly set up, while all around battles continued over borders, which had still not been agreed.

As the state became outwardly more stable, cracks began to show in Polish society, which had been quickly cobbled together. Five different currencies were in circulation, all of which were being eaten up by a gigantic rate of inflation. In the army, officers spoke four different technical languages, while in the courts, all three of the civil codes of the now defunct partition powers applied equally. Railway tracks in the east of Poland were of a different gauge from those in the west.

Eighteen parties were at loggerheads, accusing each other of betraying national interests. There was neither a Polish administration nor

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a Polish school system. Nearly one third of the Polish population in the former Russian-controlled region was illiterate. The new state was in opposition to the national minorities. Suspicious, our few reliable allies kept their distance. Trying to integrate such confusion would have been too much for even the most perfectly coordinated state apparatus. Although the “joy at reclaiming the pile of rubbish”, as the writer Julius Kaden-Bandrowski mockingly put it, did make it easier to create state institutions quickly, it could not cushion all of the divisive conflicts.

Unlike the period of the 1914/18 war, Polish politics was dominated more by an ethics of conviction than of responsibility. The parties resembled loose networks grouped around a few prominent politicians, and political programmes were less important than emotions and beliefs. Coalition governments were often brought down by the sharp division of the parties in the Sejm, and the ranting and raving of the people’s representatives was scarcely able to mask their lack of basic political experience.

Thus Adam Krzemiñski, who today works for POLYTIKA and is an expert on Germany and the EU.

Pi³sudski, Dmowski, Korfanty, Miko³ajczyk...

Historians agree that three Polish politicians in particular shaped the history of their country between the wars: Jozef Pi³sudski, Roman Dmowski and Wojciech Korfanty. All three were active before and after 1900, around the time of partition, and the first two are still regarded today as both political teachers and representatives of totally different views on national orientations. This was demonstrated recently by Jaros³aw Kaczyñski, who asked that his twin brother – who was killed in a plane crash – be buried in the same crypt as Jozef Pi³sudski at Wawel Cathedral in Krakow, and not with other former presidents of the Republic in Warsaw.

Of the “commoners” who shaped political life in Poland for a time after the Second World War, the farmers’ leader Stanis³aw Miko³ajczyk stands out. His brief successes against Stalin’s followers did not bring about change, and his life in exile after 1947 ended in tragedy.

Roman Dmowksi was born in Kamionki near Warsaw in 1864 and died near £om¿a in 1939 before the start of the war. As a young man, he was imprisoned for six months for taking part in a demonstration. In 1895, the young nationalist politician fled to Lemberg in Austria, where he became editor of the magazine Przeglad Wszechpolski (Pan-Polish Review). Two years later, he founded the National Democratic Party / Stronnictwo Narodowo-Demokratycne. After travelling in England and France, in 1900 he 20

declared sympathy for Russia and split his party. His life-long hatred of Pi³sudski began when he tried to sabotage the delivery of weapons to anti-Russian Polish forces. In 1905, he returned to the Russian part of the country, and twice was given a seat in the Russian Duma. He fought Pi³sudski’s followers with anti-Semitic tirades, travelled to the West in 1915, and in 1917 founded the anti-German Polish National Committee in Lausanne. He later signed the Treaty of Versailles on Roman Dmowski behalf of Poland. When the Soviet regime took over in Russia, Dmowski spoke out against Moscow and called for a Catholic Polish state without national minorities. He spoke out against Pi³sudski, who was not opposed to a multinational Poland. After the May Coup (1926), Dmowski founded the “Camp of Great Poland”, and later the National Party, which formally existed until 1947. Dmowski only had real governmental power once, very briefly, when he was foreign minister under Prime Minister Wincenty Witos for two months in 1923. Dmowski died in 1939.

Józef Pi³sudski was born in Zujów in Russia in 1867 and died in Warsaw in 1935. As a student and young socialist in Kharkiv, he was imprisoned and exiled to Siberia until 1892. In 1884, he led the socialist newspaper Robotnik (The Worker), and in 1905 he joined the movement to set up a “Polish Legion” on Austrian soil. Because he was prepared to cooperate with the Germans against the Russians, he received support from Marshall von Hindenburg. However, the two had a falling out, and the Germans imprisoned Pi³sudski in Magdeburg. He returned from there to become head of the new Polish army, and in 1920 he achieved an historic victory over the Red Army at the Vistula. In 1921, he secured a massive eastward expansion of the nation in the Latvian–Soviet Peace Treaty, became head of state, and allowed a multiparty system, even though in 1926 he staged a coup “against the party chaos in the Sejm”. Although the Poles and the Germans constantly fought over borders after 1918, and the German minority in Poland was Józef Pi³sudski suffering, Pi³sudski signed a non-aggression pact with Hitler in 1934. Pi³sudski’s dictatorship copied some of the fascist ways of Rome and Vienna very slightly, in particular their anti-democratic clerical ways. One thing that can be credited to Pi³sudski is his opposition to plans by the senior military to attack Germany in the early 1930s. When he died, power was not transferred into the hands of democratic parties, but rather to senior members of the military. These even entered into the “Munich Agreement” in 1938, and received a small piece of Czechoslovakia, from which incidentally Jerzy Buzek’s family originates.

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Wojciech Korfanty was born Albert Korfanty not far from Siemianowice Œl¹skie in 1873. He died in Warsaw in 1939, a few weeks before the outbreak of the war. Korfanty, described by Gazeta Wyborcza as “the most significant Silesian of the 20th century”, was a fervent Catholic Polish patriot with nationalistic tendencies, and was thus a classic example of the battles between different languages and nationalities that had poisoned the border regions in Central Eastern Europe since 1870, when nation states had begun to grow in stature. Even as a schoolboy, he rebelled against the German administration, and became a member of the National Democrats (“Poland Party”). Between 1903 and 1912, he was a member of the German Reichstag, in which quite a few minorities had seats. In 1918, he called for German provinces with Polish populations to be annexed to Poland, quoting US President Wilson. After 1919, Korfanty “Polonised” his first name, and played a leading role in the three Upper Silesian uprisings against the Germans. He did not bow to the decisions as to borders until 1921. He held the position of prime minister briefly in 1922, and then sat in the Sejm as a member of the Christian Democrat Party between 1922 and Third from the left: 1930. This party was succeeded in 1937 by Wojciech Korfanty the Stronnictwo Pracy (Labour Party), which received funding from the British Labour Party. For a while, Korfanty lived as an emigrant in what is today the Czech Republic. He died in 1939 before the war broke out. The Polish Christian Democrats (Stronnictwo Pracy), who went into exile in Western Europe after 1945, repeatedly declared their support for Korfanty. Karol Popiel, who represented the party in talks with the US authorities and the UN, became president of the party while in exile.

Stanis³aw Miko³ajczyk was Poland’s most important agrarian politician of the 20th century. He was, and still is, a controversial character. Conflicts from his time continue to this day. There are some connections between Miko³ajczyk and the present-day agrarian party PSL, Donald Tusk’s coalition partner.

Stanis³aw Miko³ajczyk was born in 1901 in Germany’s Ruhr coal-mining region. His family moved to Poland in 1911, and he died in exile in the US in 1966 after a political life marked by disappointment. At the age of 19, he fought for Poland against the Soviet army, before making a career in the agrarian party PSL. In 1933, he entered the Sejm as its youngest member, and in 1937 he became president of the PSL. He remained an opponent of the authoritarian Marshal Józef Pi³sudski.

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During the war, Miko³ajczyk fled via Hungary, Italy and France to England, where he joined Poland’s government in exile, becoming deputy prime minister under General W³adys³aw Sikorski in 1941. When Sikorski died in 1943, Miko³ajczyk took on his difficult job. Speaking at the assumption of office, he said, “We do not just want a formal democracy (in Poland), rather social democracy, that guarantees social and economic freedom as well as political, religious and individual freedom.” After the victory, he confirmed, there would not be “any authoritarian government” in Poland. Then, in 1943, came the news of Stalin’s execution orders, which did not only apply to Polish officers and civilian deportees in Katyn in Russia.

In 1944, at Winston Churchill’s request, the western Allies tried to bring about talks between Stalin and the Poles living in London. They failed, both because of the Katyn massacre and because of Stalin’s refusal to discuss post-war borders. Although the Kremlin did agree to a coalition government after the liberation of Poland, they made sure it was a Stanis³aw left-wing socialist government. Miko³ajczyk was only Miko³ajczyk allowed to become second deputy prime minister.

He returned home to much acclaim, and quickly rebuilt the PSL. In May 1946, it already had 800,000 members. During the time of exile in London, four parties had been involved in leadership: the PPS (Socialists), the PSL (agrarian party) the SP (Christian Democrats) and the SN (Nationalists). Now, in 1946, Miko³ajczyk declared that it would make sense for his party to belong to the leadership. When elections were held in Poland, two out of three citizens voted for the PSL. Led by the Kremlin, the Communists adopted an increasingly confrontational stance.

In June 1946, the PSL became the subject of persecution. When the left-wingers won 394 seats in the Sejm in the last free elections, and the PSL only 28, it was clear from Warsaw to Washington that this was a case of unscrupulous fraud. More and more PSL officials were murdered or simply disappeared. Miko³ajczyk left the government and fled to the US in April 1947. He was caught between a rock and a hard place: the Polish exiles in London called him a traitor because of his attempts to share government in Warsaw. The Western Powers submitted to Stalin, and thus also to his supporters in Eastern and Central Eastern Europe. Miko³ajczyk led the “Green International”, a global farmers’ union, until 1964. In June 2000, his remains were returned to Poland for a second burial.

When Miko³ajczyk fled in 1947, the part of the PSL willing to cooperate stayed behind and became the bloc party ZSL. When the EPP began to probe the situation in 1988 (The Travels of Egon A. Klepsch, from page 51), they discovered high-ranking ZSL officials who stood shoulder to shoul23

der with the communists as if they had nothing else in mind other than reforms. These ZSL beneficiaries commanded considerable funds and capital goods, not to mention offices and Soviet cars.

Solidarity counted among its members – not unexpectedly – many older citizens who had remained loyal to the old PSL until 1947. Now, in 1989, they deemed the ZSL leadership to be made up of traitors. Some problems could be solved by younger and unencumbered leaders. Waldemar Pawlak, who is still head of the new PSL, is a symbol of this. Because the past could not be entirely forgotten in the battles that followed the fall of communism, Poland still has a separate agrarian party. It is popular even with voters not in the agricultural industry, according to a Christian Democrat Popular Party programme, and seeks to woo the middle classes. So Mikolajczyk’s ghost lives on…

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Europe after 1945 – bridges blown up After 1945, all opportunities for western European Christian Democrats to talk with friends in the east or southeast of the continent, or even to meet with them, disappeared at the beginning of the Cold War, before anything sensible could be decided. After the return of Polish combatants from Europe and other parts of the world, there was soon a complete lack of dialogue between the East and the West. Many Poles simply did not return to their de facto Russian-occupied homeland. They stayed in the West and got on with the job of surviving rather than bothering about “the politics of yesterday”.

In 1949, immediately after the end of the Berlin airlift, Christian Democrats made initial, low-key contact with Polish friends in the West, mainly in Italy, France, Belgium and the Netherlands. No meetings took place in Germany; at most a few private friendships were established.

Relationships were only made public in Munich and a few centres of Polish emigration such as Mannheim, mainly through contacts with radio broadcasters like Radio Free Europe (RFE) and Radio Liberty, as there were a few Poles who were able to talk about the situation in Poland in the presence of German people.

When the Christian Democrats in the six countries that made up the European Coal and Steel Community got together, there was still no reason for building bridges outside the private sphere: during and after Stalinism, nothing was possible. After the Hungary Revolution of 1956, there were contacts, but not party-political ones. West Germans were able to glean something of the situation in Poland here and there, although the focus would be different depending on whether the news came from friends of people in exile, the Catholic peace movement Pax Christi, or academic institutions.

Finally, in the 1960s, the situation eased, and more private meetings were possible, although they never formed part of any Christian Democratic action. It was not until the Helsinki Agreement that the winds changed: the EUCD began to undertake systematic studies of the situation in Central and Eastern Europe, and the EPP continued these activities in a more formalised fashion. The national Christian Democrat parties looked on as the slow business of making contacts unfolded, only providing hesitant support to “frontline states”, i.e. states that bordered the “Communist region”, mainly Germany, Austria and Scandinavia.

The change in climate was also linked at the time to changes in Moscow, which were not always easy to analyse. The following document shows an unexpected effect of the beginning of the Gorbachev era on the politics of the EPP and the EPP Group.

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The story behind an invitation to Moscow When Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in the Kremlin, he and a small group of people with experience of the West changed and modified Soviet foreign policy. The integration of Europe became recognised as being politically relevant, no longer as just an economic challenge. A new idea emerged, that of increasing parliamentary involvement in the policy of détente. Not many people knew at the time that the Kremlin was also thinking of the European Parliament. Yet Europe’s Christian Democrats were aware of Gorbachev’s new contact policy as early as 1987.

At the beginning of 1987, Lew Tolkunov, a friend of Mikhail Gorbachev, invited the presidency of the European People’s Party (EPP) Group in the European Parliament to Moscow, under the leadership of the German Dr Egon Alfred Klepsch (CDU). The host was at the time the president of the Supreme Soviet.

In discussions with three comrades who were familiar with the outside world, including the USA, Tolkunov had quoted from his book, The Great Role of Parliaments, which he published soon after. His guinea pigs in the Politburo were enthusiastic. The book was a masterful dialectical adaptation of Leninism to what he recognised as the capitalist superiority of the West. Of course, Tolkunov wrote, wending his way past dogmas, that they had blocked the “dangers to world peace” through solid agreements with the West, but now it was necessary for all (sic!) parliaments in the East and the West to join the “peace front”.

Tolkunov told doubtful Kremlin folk, “I know what I’m talking about.

In 1962 I was in New York, before travelling around the rest of the US.” However, to close friends only he said: “I was injured in the war that counts. Anyone who wasn’t in the war doesn’t know what they’re talking about today.”

Tolkunov began studying journalism in 1956, after Stalin’s death.

A British former student remembers: “Lew often used to say he wouldn’t have dared to become a journalist if Stalin was still alive.”

He was soon on the executive floor of the government newspaper Izvestia; later, he ran the newspaper, and baffled a few New York colleagues by suggesting an article exchange. The plan did get off the ground, but petered out later on, “I don’t know why” (Tolkunov).

They had begun on 28 February 1970 with two texts in America Today, “in the middle of the Cold War”. Occasionally he would write a communist polemic, probably just to cover himself. His book Myths and Realities is by this other Tolkunov. It even impressed western anti-communists.

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Tolkunov and his comrades experienced a turbulent time during the Vietnam War, the violence of which nobody could have predicted. They had previously all marvelled, silently but hopefully, at the great diplomat Henry Kissinger and hoped for “deals” (disarmament) with Richard Nixon. Then, when the Vietnam War broke out, they avoided the contact-seeking Kissinger in the UN building in New York, and boded their time like so many other Russians. Russians can even make careful plans for waiting.

Tolkunov was quick to comment positively on Nixon’s China policy. At that time, he initiated a close political relationship with Alexander Yakovlev (“The Fate of Marxism in Russia”), the “real” man behind Gorbachev’s principles, and adviser to the new man in the Kremlin since 1980, the year of the “Solidarity outbreak” in Poland. Speaking in 1980, he said, “We can’t both lose the arms race and allow this Solidarity to be successful”. Tolkunov’s 1984 statement that parliaments should cooperate “no matter who they are or where they come from” follows on from this perfectly. His only requirement was that they should not be “full of eunuchs, like those in Moscow, Prague and East Berlin”.

Why did Tolkunov extend an invitation to Europe’s Christian Democrats in 1987? Surely one reason is because they were the strongest power in Strasbourg. Another reason is because the German Klepsch sat ex officio on the committee of the CDU, with Helmut Kohl, who at the time of the invitation had been in power for some years and, together with Francois Mitterrand, was making more of a contribution to the strength of the European Union than his predecessors. The Kremlin observers had also noticed something that had escaped many journalistic “observers” and more nationally-focused delegates: the European Parliament was building new direct relations with parliaments and governances around the world year after year, amongst other things by means of “permanent delegations”.

Many factors seemed to work together, including the fact that the Socialist International, led by Willy Brandt, was afraid of active solidarity with Russian dissidents, and in particular Polish opposition leaders, while the EPP was not. On the contrary, the longer the dictator Jaruzelski stayed in power, the more several Christian Democrat parties and the joint EPP tried to strengthen the growing Polish opposition. Moreover, EPP member parties were also concerned about the Baltic peoples, the Soviet-ruled Balkan states, and even critics in Kiev. Part of this reconnaissance and contact-building offensive was carried out via the EPP Group of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, rather than within structures of the Inter-Parliamentary Union. Nevertheless, it became clear that the Russians were removing Cold War combatants from Brussels and replacing them with “men of dialogue”, for

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example. The new climate did not have any practical effects yet, at least not in public. Tolkunov, who, ambiguous as ever, had again served up Lenin quotations at the 27th conference of the CPSU in February 1986, and then gone on to praise the “common sense of capitalist parliaments”, had recognised earlier than the old communist nomenklatura that it was not true that “US capitalists have all the say in Brussels and keep the Europeans dependent for economic reasons” (as Leonid Brezhnev asserted in 1972), but that the current European Union had been politically active for a long time, and was not just about economics. Moreover, the Kremlin was helped by more young thinkers paying visits to the West.

Consequently, Tolkunov and his followers came to respect the European Parliament, which the Kremlin had previously considered a powerless “talking shop”, not unlike some Western conservatives today.

The Russians did not even complain about the difficulty of understanding the parliamentary work that goes on in Brussels, something that is often criticised by people closer to home.

New analyses, new contacts As Western European politics advanced, so first the EUCD, then the EPP, then the EPP Group in the European Parliament increased their contacts with the East. The EPP Group has been working intensively in this area since the mid-1980s.

In contrast to what is often propagated in the media today, the Cold War was almost always marked by caution and hesitancy. Charitable aid for friends in Hungary and Poland almost always took precedence over political speeches in public. This is explained in more detail in the chapter “Amici Poloniae”, which discusses the discreet cooperation between politics and Caritas in Poland.

Before I move on to more intensive political contacts with Polish friends, I must explain the extent of the potential and information that was available to us in the West. I have already mentioned that, because of the Cold War, people in the West were generally less informed about Poland: this was because some information simply disappeared or became the victim of the natural course of generation change.

Between the war and the election of Pope John Paul II, leading West European Christian Democrats perceived Poland – the state and the society – as follows: y The people are oppressed. Only a few citizens are reliable communists. The Kremlin treats the people with caution = large-scale renouncement of nationalisation of Polish agriculture;

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y The Catholic Church is strongly opposed to communist ideology – compared with all other states dependent on Moscow; y (Relatively) good opportunities for studying abroad are increasing; y Limited press and radio censorship, which resulted in the sale of critical Polish newspapers being banned in Moscow after 1970; y Some freedom for (undubbed) US TV films; y No monopoly of state youth in the style of the Free German Youth, e.g. Scouts allowed; y Special status for the Catholic University of Lublin (CUL); y Clergy integrated into the military; y After a time of persecution, relative coexistence between church and state; y Communists relatively unopposed to spiritual and social change, even before the foundation of the popular Solidarity movement.

There was therefore much that was “relative”, which was nevertheless highly significant for the development of the EUCD/EPP contact-building plan. There was a general feeling, and not only among the Germans, of being able to extend solidarity to Poland, in particular, “behind the backs” of states like the GDR and the CSSR, thus contributing to breaking up the “bloc”. When Pope John Paul II addressed the European Parliament in Strasbourg in 1988, he later told a small group of people that he too was hopeful that the Eastern Bloc would begin to splinter.

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Four phases in EPP’s efforts to build bridges with Poland It is clear from the above that the political powers in the West were not able to build real relationships, at least not between parties, until the end of a long post-war development period. The primary question to be asked is: Who in the West was willing and able to build bridges, and what chance was there of success? I have split the period in question into phases: y y y y

1946 1960 1980 1999

– – – –

1960 1980 1999 2004

Cold War weakened Cold War democratic awakening EU entry phase

qród³o: „Dialog”

Phase 1946 – 1960 Apart from Germans who had been expelled (“Workshop notes” page 93) and Poles who ended up abroad, hardly anyone in the Western civil sector was interested in Poland in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War. Those in exile soon learnt that any hope of return was simply an illusion. The Poles “caught” abroad had to decide whether they wanted to return to an increasingly undemocratic Poland that was dependent on the Soviet Union. Western politicians were forced to look on as the Kremlin first denied the Poles access to the benefits contained in the Marshall Plan (in 1947), and then banned them from joining the European Council (in 1949). As a result, Europe’s Christian Democrats had to become involved in the Cold War. For most of them this was not difficult, as the communist battle against church and belief was particularly fierce until Stalin’s death in 1953, and was accompanied by hostile disciplinary action, which in Poland even led to the imprisonment of Cardinal Primate Stefan Wyszyñski. The exiled youth organisation of the Central European Christian Democrats began global action, supported by friends in the US. It travelled around Europe and Asia providing information about communism in Poland and Hungary.

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Phase 1960 – 1980 This period saw a reawakening of interest in “the East”, particularly in Austria and the six countries that made up the European Coal and Steel Community. Adult education colleges started to offer classes on Polish history and present-day Poland. With help from the media, specialists like Father Werenfried van Straaten (NL) organised help for the churches, particularly the Catholic Church. For the first time, Western colleges granted scholarships to Polish applicants. The media finally began to focus on Poland when, after 1956, and in particular after 1970, workers and intellectuals in Poland joined forces to demand reforms. In 1976, Adam Michnik met with members of the CDU (Richard von Weizsäcker, Alois Mertes, Werner Marx, Jürgen Wahl) in Bonn for the first time, albeit unofficially.

Michnik, who was not a Christian, made a paper available that he had just presented at the “1956 – 1976” meeting in Paris. We were delighted to discover the extent of agreement between Catholic and non-Christian opposition forces in Poland. When Adam Michnik returned to Warsaw after our meeting, he was once again imprisoned.

Adam Michnik’s Paris Theses Adam Michnik, one of the most prominent members of the Polish opposition, presented a paper entitled “New Evolution Theory” at the “1956 – 1976” colloquium in Paris at the end of September 1976, and then gave it to Richard von Weizsäcker and three other CDU politicians in Bonn to read in German translation. One reason he did so was because, in the speech, he had praised the role of Catholic Sejm member Stanis³aw Stomma. Stomma was a leader of the independent group ZNAK (meaning sign or symbol). At the time, there were two groups in Poland hoping for a change in the system, the revisionists and the neo-positivists. Their significance and orientation was the subject of discussion at the Sorbonne in Paris, amongst other places in the West. Below is an extract from Michnik’s speech …

The experiences of the neo-positivists deserve close examination. There is no question that their activity helped make public opinion more independent, to some extent, and also helped people to think more broadly than was previously permissible in accordance with public culture, science and party propaganda.

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The ZNAK movement arose in 1956 out of the principle of geopolitical realism, which I have already mentioned, in the name of the tragic experience of the 1944 Warsaw Uprising and in general view of the tendency towards insurrection in Poland. The ZNAK movement has received important concessions in exchange for power with the support of Gomu³ka (the new First Secretary of the Communist Party) and the new party leadership. It has thus been able to set up the “Clubs of Catholic Intelligentsia”, resume publication of the newspaper Tygodnik Powszechny in Kraków, and set up the ZNAK publishing house, which published a magazine of the same name.

The ZNAK movement had succeeded in speaking its own language and presenting its own national cultural model. It has been very successful. One should therefore not underestimate the value of adapting modern Christian beliefs to Polish intellectualism. One should also not underestimate the role played by books by Stefan Kisielewski, Hanna Malewska, Jerzy Turowicz, Jerzy Zawiejski, Stanis³aw Stomma, Antoni Golubiew and Jacek WoŸniakowski.

The parliamentary interventions of some of these personalities have given young Poles a foretaste of political pluralism. Even though, in accordance with their principles, it has never been necessary or possible for the ZNAK representatives to play the role of a realistic opposition, they remained pragmatic and Catholic supporters of “His Royal Socialist Highness”.

ZNAK’s support for the communist Gomu³ka was linked to a particular political stance: an increase in the sovereignty of the Polish state with regard to the USSR; in other words, a new formulation of economic agreements, the withdrawal of Soviet advisors, and more freedom for citizens. This phase was characterised by a progressive normalisation of relations between State and Church (release of the Cardinal Primate, renunciation of administrative harassment, legalisation of religious education, etc.). The ZNAK movement has supported the government in this area with restraint and dignity. Just like the revisionists, therefore, the Catholics expected concessions “from above”, and were less concerned with organising social oppositional pressure. They favoured cooperation over conflict. They sought to agree with the Party and did not want to be seen as the opposition and nothing more.

Although the leaders of ZNAK never committed the cardinal sin of the revisionists, as they always emphasised their sympathy for different political ideas, their behaviour nevertheless betrayed their critical views.

After all, politics of understanding only makes sense if it is taken seriously by both parties involved.

Relationships with a communist power that has deleted the word “understanding” from its political vocabulary are only justified if they

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are conducted from a position of strength. If not, then “understanding” becomes capitulation on the way to political self-destruction. This is what happened to ZNAK’s parliamentary group.

ZNAK’s consent to the successive removal of its members from the Sejm sowed compromise into the movement’s party line. Concessions made in principle led to a loss of authority for the ZNAK delegates, not only in relation to those in power, but also to Catholics. ZNAK delegates chose a path that led, via compromise, to a loss of identity. This is of course a serious accusation. But it is difficult to find other words for it, because when it came to the vote on pro-Soviet changes to the constitution, only Stanis³aw Stomma opposed this and had the courage to abstain.

The period of détente saw the emergence of an association for the support of Polish students in Germany, in Freiburg and Lublin. Christian Democrats in the Netherlands went to meetings of left wing “peace campaigners” and unmasked Polish guests who tolerated the interests of the Warsaw nomenklatura and criticised the Polish Pope. Polish groups were founded in several EEC countries, often with links to institutes working against communist infiltration. Young exiles from Central and Eastern Europe became full members of the International Union of Young Christian Democrats, and campaigned for “freedom and self-determination for all European countries” at its conferences, e.g. in Berlin and Montevideo.

Phase 1980 to 1999 The founding of the Solidarity trade union and popular movement in 1980, and its growth to eleven million members, marked the beginning of the phase during which the EPP decided 1) to investigate the possibilities of democracy in Poland, and 2) to then investigate and develop contacts with potential partner parties if there was hope of agreement with the EPP programme. This phase was the most difficult because 1) it began with nearly 200 parties in Warsaw seeking official authorisation, 2) there turned out to be differences between the EPP’s findings in Poland and the assessments of the situation made by some EPP member parties, and 3) the EPP soon recognised there was no solid partner available in the short-term, so it became necessary to play for time in order to avoid offending anyone.

There was no halting the advancement of the new Republic of Poland, and so a variety of complicated processes for solving partnership crises arose. Eventually, Civic Platform (PO) “mendelised” as the only party that fully agreed with the EPP line, and it sensibly allied itself with the smaller PSL, which was already a member of the EPP.

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The years leading up to 1999 were very painful for many of those involved, in particular a number of politically active Catholics in Germany, who were and still are friends with representatives of Tadeusz Mazowiecki’s “Freedom Union” (Unia Wolnosci). They and friends from other EU core states had to come to terms with the fact that, although these Polish partners quickly found their way to the EPP, they soon left again to join the European Liberals.

In spite of the difficulties, the EPP and the EPP Group’s Robert Schuman Foundation were able to support Polish friends and partners on their way to Strasbourg and Brussels. They provided the latter with advice, documents outlining political programmes and earlier EPP phases, papers on Poland’s entry to the EU, and so on. The Schuman Foundation organised seminars (see the chapter discussing the Foundation). Large numbers of Polish political forces, from students to factory managers, were invited to Brussels and Strasbourg. The EPP Group in particular visited Warsaw several times, as well as Gdañsk and Kraków.

After martial law When the EPP and the Robert Schuman Foundation began their joint work in Poland, martial law had come to an end. Both Poles and the “guests from Brussels” promptly agreed that they all needed to learn from each other. There followed a certain amount of experimentation, a few examples of which are listed below. z “Conferences” for local government leaders. The experience of western political foundations had shown that, although talks at the highest level were important, they were not as important for building bridges as invitations to “small” local government leaders to come and meet guests from the West and discuss present and future problems. Such meetings were held first in Upper Silesia and then in Gdañsk. z For Polish friends living near the German border, EU regional policy was at first a “book with seven seals”. To help, the Robert Schuman Foundation invited local politicians from places like Saxony and the Czech Republic to come and learn about regional policy together with Polish guests, using examples of Franco-Spanish and German-Danish projects, among others, to illustrate the points made. One of the speakers was the Sorbian politician Stanis³aw Tillich, who became a member of the European Parliament after the reunification of Germany and is currently the minister-president of Saxony.

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z People in Poland were concerned that Germany was planning great privileges for the Germany minority, for example in Silesia. The EPP parties therefore sent advisors to Poland who had already worked for some years as minority representatives, e.g. a local politician who represented the Danish minority in Germany. MEP Concepció Ferrer explained the unique position of the Catalan people in Spain. z Environmental policy was and remains a difficult area of politics.

Some Poles thought they would not be able to meet the demands of “Brussels” after joining the EU. Again, we presented this chapter of European politics in the light of West European practice, and not from the point of view of bureaucrats.

The Republic of Poland sets off for Brussels There had already been close cooperation between EPP MEPs and members of the Polish delegation even before Poland joined the EU, namely in the European Convention. The EPP Group had already cooperated with new members from Poland – who had aligned themselves variously with the Christian Democrat, Liberal and Conservative party groups – in the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg.

These contacts helped defuse many of the attempts by Polish Eurosceptic parties and the media to sabotage the EPP’s integration course. At the same time, the Schuman Foundation accepted several Poles onto its Stagiaire Programme, and was able to discreetly pick out candidates who seemed likely to be suitable for a job in Brussels after Poland’s entry to the EU. Former Schuman Foundation stagiaires were particularly helpful in providing advice and support to help set up the Civic Platform party (PO), particularly in Wroc³aw, Warsaw and Upper Silesia.

1999 – 2004 Looking at the previous phase, one might conclude that it was child’s play to help Poland and to consolidate the EPP between 1999 and EU entry. Wrong! Anyone reading the minutes of EPP membership negotiations today might be surprised that Poland joined the EU all. Western players committed a whole series of commercial policy reservations to paper, ranging from concerns about Polish environmental damage to fears about Polish economic migrants. In addition, finance and budget experts regularly criticised the interim results of membership negotiations.

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It is therefore worth repeating that Helmut Kohl, Romano Prodi and Jean-Claude Juncker, to name just three EPP politicians, have constantly put pressure on the Brussels Commission and called for the great promises made to Poland to be kept. On the other hand, Poland’s younger politicians should know of the hatred stirred up by right-wing EU sceptics in Warsaw against outstanding Polish Brussels negotiators, in particular against Jan Ku³akowski. Right-wingers and the remains of the old communist nomenklatura hand in hand!

The battle for the agricultural market marked a particularly dark chapter, which did not end until peoPoland’s fears in Brussels ple in Brussels saw who was really supplying the Polish agricultural market – or the world market – and who was still running round with figures from the plan rouge. The falsely high figures did not only come from old ZSL sources, but also from western farmers’ unions that had been taken in by old statistics from Warsaw.

In the final phase before entry, the EPP succeeded in getting parliamentary “observer” status agreed, making it easier for the EPP and its elected successors to train newcomers in EU parliamentary work. “Observer” status was first negotiated by the unified Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall, as there were still no European elections in the foundering GDR. A few Poles who were not members of the EPP believed until the very end that they could sit in the Parliament as a Polish bloc, not split into political families but arranged in political order, like in the German Reichstag before 1918. The Robert Schuman Foundation therefore produced a small book entitled Poland on the Way to Strasbourg in 2002, which was full of information about the European Parliament. There now follow a few pages about “pioneers”, men and women, both Poles and friends of Poland, who held the belief for decades that not only had Poland long been a part of the European family, but that it also belonged to the united Europe created after the Second World War.

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PIONEERS I Political pioneers helped build a new Poland. A few also already represented the European politics of Christian Democratic parties and groups.

I shall introduce several pioneers throughout the course of this book. The first group consists of one Pole and two Germans, who together represent three European generations.

Józef Retinger (1888 – 1960) Visions against Europe’s wars Józef Retinger was born on 17 April 1888 in what was at the time Austrian Kraków. Viennese rule over southeast Poland and the Duchy of Upper and Lower Silesia was at the time more lenient than that exercised by the Russian and Prussian partitioning powers, which had existed from 1792 and 1815.

In 1917, the Pole Retinger, who had already travelled a good deal, met the Englishman Arthur Capel, who told him of a plan for a humane world Józef Retinger government, based on a progressive Anglo-French cooperation. Capel was an assistant to Sir Henry Wilson, enjoyed the protection of Aristide Briand, and was received by a number of cardinals in the Vatican. After the First World War, he was active in setting up the League of Nations in Geneva. When Capel died in a car accident, Retinger gave up his Geneva work.

The polyglot Pole had been a supporter of pan-European ideas since his youth, and in 1924 he became enthusiastic about “this great, unique peace plan”. His partner was E. D. Morell. This friend also soon died, and for a while Retinger was left hanging. He maintained relations with Benedetto Croce.

In 1927, Retinger came up with the idea of writing a pan-European encyclopaedia. Left-wing Britons were particularly supportive of this, including Ernest Bevin, who had recently been elected general secretary of the British Transport and General Workers’ Union. Other Labour members also helped Retinger. It is a little known fact that many English Catholics became involved with the Labour Party because of its positive stance on international relations.

Retinger lost Bevin’s favour before 1939, stopped working on the encyclopaedia and finally found his life’s political meaning: accelerating the development of the idea of Europe during the Second World War. In London, he met exiled Belgian politicians such as Paul van Zeeland. He was 37

close friends with Marcel-Henri Jaspar, through whom he met Paul Henri Spaak and General Wladys³aw Sikorski, the head of the Polish government in exile. This group began discussing European integration after the expected victory over Hitler quite early on. Pieter Kerstens, van Kleffens, and even Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands joined in, and were quickly followed by Greeks and Czechs; only the exiled Norwegians were initially uninterested in a “European initiative”.

Retinger suggested to Sikorski that he hold regular meetings of foreign ministers. These began successfully in October 1942, and only ended with Sikorski’s death in 1943 in a plane crash near Gibraltar, which was never fully explained. A few months later, Retinger parachuted into his homeland and fought with the underground army (Armia Krajowa).

Then he returned to London.

The following people took part in the Sikorski meetings, of which there were twenty: Sikorski, Retinger, Raczynski (PL), Jan Masaryk, Hubert Pipka (CZ), Aghnides, Pipinelis (GR), Trygve Lie, Raestad (N), Nimtiæ, Gawroviæ (YU), Josef Bech (L), Paul Henri Spaak, van Langenhove (B), Van Kleffens, Kerstens (NL). Interestingly, Masaryk and Beneš came to an arrangement with Stalin in 1943, upon which they “logically” stopped attending the Sikorski meetings.

It is hardly believable today, Winston Churchill (r.) visits General but at the height of the war Wladys³aw Sikorski, the Polish prime (1941), discussions were already minister in exile taking place in London concerning a merger of the Benelux states. Had people already begun to suspect that this “artificial construct” (Churchill) might later be useful as a kind of “counterbalance” between the French and the Germans?

At the end of the war, Retinger – like so many outstanding Poles in exile in the West – was in a difficult position. Because they were nothing more than Soviet parrots, the Warsaw communists claimed he was a devoted follower, even an agent, of the USA. Nevertheless, Retinger continued to preach in favour of a “United States of Europe”, although obviously not beside the Vistula.

On 7 May 1946, he gave a stirring speech at London’s famous Chatham House. Together with Paul van Zeeland, he founded an “Independent European League for Economic Cooperation”, as they had no desire to be a government body. They quickly put out feelers in the USA and Canada, and even in the Soviet Union to begin with.

Later, when the Marshall Plan came into operation, they adapted to it realistically. The league’s relationship with US foreign minister Averell 38

Harriman, who in winter 1949/50 discreetly encouraged Robert Schuman to seek reconciliation with the Germans, was particularly important.

Retinger began to travel to the USA more and more often. There, John Foster Dulles joked: “The Russians will definitely be in favour of European unification if they can chair the board.” In the meantime, Retinger’s homeland was groaning under new occupation, this time by the communists. Politicians emigrated in large numbers, and Retinger tried to win their allegiance, not always with success. The refugees considered him too idealistic.

The league planners even tried – albeit in vain – to win over neutral states like Sweden and Austria. “Parallel” initiatives became more interesting. The Christian Democrats, who had already formed loose associations in Central and Southern Europe prior to 1933 and 1939 respectively, and who were generally to be limited to democratic Catholic areas, founded the “Nouvelles Equipes Internationales” (NEI). The Schuman plan of May 1950 “fitted in” with this initiative. Even a small number of British Conservatives dared to set up a “United Europe Movement”. Continental federalists gathered together, first on the left and then in the somewhat conservative camp of the “pan-Europeans”. Retinger travelled around promoting “as united a European movement as possible”. In December, he succeeded in setting up an International Committee of the Movements for European Unity, although this was short-lived.

The climax of the post-war “pro-Europe” wave was the already legendary Hague Congress in 1948. Retinger attended the congress, and complained about how difficult it was to organise: “No-one had any money and lots of people argued about having to pay a contribution.” Accommodation had to be found for 750 people, all of them individualists, not “delegates”. There were also journalists and lots of helpers. In the end, the awakening cost £40,000, “a huge amount” so soon after the war, according to Retinger.

Retinger’s role in the Vatican is less well known. His most important contribution was his strong advocacy of equal involvement of Catholics and Protestants in the construction of the new Europe. Alcide De Gasperi and a good proportion of the Polish population living in Italy all voiced their support for him.

On 15 April 1948, Retinger sent an important letter to Guy Mollet, which contained the suggestion that the upcoming French Socialists’ conference should support the planned Hague Congress and soften the resistance of British Labour comrades to the plans. Churchill was only to make one speech at The Hague, and only in the first meeting. He had also asked Léon Blum to deliver the closing speech of the conference. They were making every effort to involve all democratic powers.

Like others at the beginning of the European movement, Retinger held fast to the ideal of inter-party action. When he died in 1960, the European 39

federalists had already lost a lot of ground, and it was around 1970 that people first conceived of party political “families” in the European Community. Nevertheless, this profiling for a long time did not stop the centre left and right parties from cooperating. The Walloon socialist Paul Henri Spaak was symbolic of this.

Jan Pomian, who worked with Retinger for 20 years, wrote a biography in 1994 entitled Józef Retinger: ¿ycie i pamiêtniki pioniera Jednoœci Europejskiej (Jozef Retinger, life and recognition of a pioneer in the unification of Europe). The Polish Robert Schuman Foundation in Warsaw keeps the memory of Józef Retinger alive.

Klaus Otto Skibowski: To Poland, with the support of Adenauer He is now 85 years old and affectionately known as “Ski”, not only in Bonn. He was one of Konrad Adenauer’s advisors and the first German to travel to Poland after the war with the blessing of the chancellor, at the invitation of the highest representative of the Catholic Church. Skibowski was a co-founder of the “Junge Union”, the political youth organisation of the CDU.

In autumn 1956, the Poznañ Uprising was defeated, Wladys³aw Gomu³ka, the “reforming communist” dismissed by Stalin, was in power again in Warsaw, and the Primate of Poland Stefan Wyszyñski was set free. A political spring was in „Ski” Skibowski the air in Poland. In Bonn, Catholic journalist Klaus Otto Skibowski, who was originally from E³k in East Prussia, was amazed.

In Bonn, Adenauer reminded his trusted circle, of which “Ski” was a member that he had always believed in the need for post-war reconciliation to rest on the pillars of France, Israel and Poland. Skibowski remembers: “The chancellor reacted almost instinctively to the situation in Poznañ. The debate about possible steps to take focused on potential routes with the church. As we at the KNA (Catholic news agency) were already in contact with Polish church newspapers, the matter somehow ended up in my hands.” This was because “Ski”, born in 1925, was also an advisor to Adenauer, and organised his elections, amongst other things.

The KNA media contacts operated via the Netherlands, and the airline KLM provided discreet help. Skibowkski also had a contact via Paris, with 40

the Polish priest Gozdziéwicz, who was private secretary to the Primate and later became his chief of staff. As Warsaw was aware of the KNA connection to the chancellery in Bonn, Gozdziéwicz encouraged the office to visit Poland: “One of you would be welcome in Warsaw.”

Chancellery head Hans Globke already had similar ideas. He asked “Ski”, “Doesn’t your father have contacts to the Primate?” He had found out this piece of information via a news agency. The Primate and Skibowski senior had been music students together in Gdañsk, and Adenauer had first wanted to send Skibowski’s father to Poland, but because the Catholic manufacturer from E³k was ill in the Masurian part of East Prussia, “Ski” went instead in 1957, together with his wife. Ski was a trained journalist and co-founder of the Junge Union in North Germany.

Bonn’s experience of the state machinery in Warsaw had at the time so far been completely negative. An example: Skibowski sent to a telegram to Wyszyñski via KNA to congratulate him on his release, but the Primate never received it. Later, the Chancellor learnt that the Polish postal service had also intercepted telegrams from the German cardinals Frings and Wendel. Skibowski believes claims that the church in Germany did not react at the time are even more shameful: “Unfortunately, we can’t prove that the three telegrams were suppressed. And the US embassy in Warsaw, which was supposed to represent our interests, had been so infiltrated by pro-communist sympathisers that we couldn’t involve them either.”

In February 1957, Cardinal Josef Frings gave the official order to set off on behalf of the KNA. Globke could not have organised a better cover. In Berlin, Skibowski visited Bishop Julius Döpfner, who for the first time became involved in Adenauer’s secret Poland contacts.

On Good Friday 1957, “Ski” and his wife had their car searched for three hours by Stasi police in East Berlin, and then again in Frankfurt (Oder). “They didn’t find what they wanted, we were well equipped.”

A major was waiting for them on the Polish side, irritated by the GDR “authorities”. The two Germans commented that now at least they felt safe again!

The Poles recommended a detour on the way to Warsaw. “Ski”: “They evidently wanted me to see their border with the GDR, which was bristling with guns, bunkered, and strengthened with dug-in tanks. An officer and former participant in the Poznañ Uprising accompanied us, assisted by a young priest. The men told us that, as soon as we entered the country, we would be told the following: ‘When you go back, tell Herr Adenauer he must stay firm and refuse to give in to the communists, otherwise Poland will never be free.’” The Poles were aware of the situation in the West and were particularly afraid of the influence of the large communist parties in France and Italy. According to Skibowski, as soon as Adenauer returned from his trip to Moscow in 1955, he set up a team in the chancellery “to coordinate all the forces in the battle against communism”.

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SPD politician Carlo Schmid had already visited Poland before Skibowski. He is still credited with having “broken the ice in Poland”; however, Adenauer’s advisor learned something quite different when he was there: “Schmid addressed the university here, but he stopped precisely at the point where he could have talked specifically about freedom and the battle against communism. This did not go down well. Later, I was never able to mention Carlo Schmid again, even to communists, without them getting annoyed about either him or his book about Poland, because of his reluctance to speak out.”

Skibowski voiced Adenauer’s beliefs that Poland would never progress with the GDR, but it might one day get somewhere with a reunited Germany. After Skibowski repeated this emphatically in Poznañ’s communist press club, they made him an honorary member.

In Warsaw, the visitors attended the Primate’s Easter mass in the cathedral, and were immediately invited into the vestry. There they met the great Cardinal Wyszyñski for the first time. Gozdziéwicz confirmed what they had been told at the border: “Yes, Adenauer must continue his policy. And don’t take any notice of us if we say things we’re forced to say for domestic reasons.” According to Skibowski, the Primate defined this position both politically and ecclesiastically.

The Primate gave “Ski” the following advice: “There is only one man I trust in the Polish parliament, Professor Stanis³aw Stomma. Talk to him.”

He was less complimentary about the Polish exiles living in Paris, who were highly respected in the West: “You see, Herr Skibowski, that’s like German emigrants living in Chicago who still hanker after Wilhelm II. The Poles in Paris are thirty years behind the times.” Skibowski was also warned about the collaborating “PAX priests”. They had been blackmailed over private weaknesses. Nothing more needed to be said.

The spiritual advisors took the pair from Bonn to visit a prison: “Quite a number suffered there under Stalin.” They were also shown two cells where large letters, in particular two “A”s, had been scratched on the walls. They asked the Germans whether they could guess what this meant.

The priest said, “Quite simply, ‘A’ is for Adenauer. Christian prisoners didn’t dare scratch crosses, so they chose the symbol ‘A’.” Skibowski found this difficult to believe, but he was told, “The Communists smear the Catholic Adenauer more than any other Western politician, so to us he represents the hope of freedom.” When Skibowski told Adenauer of this on his return, the “old guy” was deeply moved and sat staring out into the park for several minutes.

The “A” story reminded friends in Munich of an incident at the Munich freight station in 1954. A Romanian refugee was freed from a waggon and asked straightaway, “Is Adenauer here?”

When the (few) German journalists allowed into Warsaw in 1957 were (partially) informed about the Skibowski mission, they did not believe it.

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“They were increasingly saying what the communists wanted to hear”, Adenauer’s now 85-year-old “mine dog” said drily. Of course, many people knew of the firm contacts established by Skibowski, but they were not able to discuss them until after the fall of communism. Then, however, “Ski” and Gisela Skibowski were made Commanders of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland by the Polish president, and were also honoured in Bonn.

From Warsaw, the Skibowskis travelled to E³k (Masuria), Klaus Otto’s place of birth, constantly shadowed by secret agents. The agents were amazed, because at every stop along the way, the local priest insisted on getting the Germans’ car washed. In E³k itself, the priest was even turned out of bed at five o’clock in the morning. In the church in E³k, the guests found a German music book, and visitors who happened to be there heard that the father of this gentleman from Bonn with the Polish name had paid for the church in E³k. Today, the Skibowskis visit E³k regularly, have lots of friends there, and enjoy the bridges they helped build.

What does that have to do with Europe and the Christian Democrats after 1989? Lots, because in 1957 the Skibowskis met Stanis³aw Stomma in Kraków, and that was the start of contacts between the CDU and politically minded Catholic Poles. There was none of the fanfare that accompanied some contacts between Poles and German peace-lovers, some of whom were real but more fake. These relationships were often splashed across the German media, which attacked Adenauer and his CDU successors tirelessly but praised Willy Brandt uncritically for years.

Stomma was a displaced person who originally hailed from Vilnius. He and fellow DP “Ski” understood each other and talked about Realpolitik rather than dreams. Admittedly, Stomma’s theory that it was possible to build political bridges “alongside governments” was too optimistic, because there were also naïve people working on the Warsaw definition of “bridges”, who failed to see the real goals being pursued by the communists.

After his talks with “Ski”, Stomma visited Bonn for the first time. The chancellery knew the visit was going to be tricky: at times, it took three cars to divert KGB members living in Bonn away from Stomma’s car. To Stomma’s regret, he did not meet Adenauer. It soon became clear that, for the Union, the importance of the agreements with the USA, England and France regarding the safeguarding of Berlin was such that official talks about Germany’s future eastern border had to fall victim to the frost of the Cold War. Even in 1957, Skibowski was impressed by Poland’s staying power: towards the end of his trip, while he was still in Kwidzyn, he received a message from Primate Wyszyñski asking him to come quickly to Czêstochowa. Thus it was that, on 3 May 1957, Polish Constitution Day, “Ski” and his wife attended Poland’s biggest rally to mark the Cardinal’s release from prison as the Primate’s guests of honour. More than a million people attended the event.

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Then something unusual happened: the man from Bonn was invited to a confidential meeting of the Polish Bishops’ Conference. There it was decided that a pastoral letter to mark the Polish millennium should be devoted to the renewal of the consecration of Poland to Our Lady of Czêstochowa. However, it was agreed that, where the text read, “believers of German origin live”, it should be altered to read “to the Queen of Heaven”, i.e. it should not contain a national stamp. Later in the church in Olsztyn, “Ski” saw for himself that the decision had been right.

The almost forgotten text of 3 May 1957 was the first departure of the Polish Church away from nationalism and towards Europe. EPP members should remember this when they come across national minorities again being disadvantaged.

The myth that the Union leadership did not make any reconciliatory contacts with Poland is completely untrue. Adenauer himself wanted – and had to – stay in the background. After the “Ski” expedition, he commissioned his party friend Paul Lücke, a leading Rhenish member of the CDU social committees and the Central Committee of German Catholics, to carry out further talks “on my behalf”. Lücke did this in agreement with Foreign Minister Heinrich von Brentano (CDU), who received Stomma and explained to him the limited extent of possibilities in Bonn at the time.

By way of example, the German journalist Edith Heller, who was living in Warsaw, later behaved as if the CDU had done nothing but slow down reconciliation between Poles and Germans, when in actual fact every president of the Central Committee of German Catholics, all of whom were members of the CDU or CSU and had large political followings, proved the opposite for years. These included for example Bernhard Vogel, Albrecht Beckel and Hans Maier.

The falsification of history was unfortunately possible because Union members had to act almost completely in secret, and left hardly any records of aid measures or political consultations in Warsaw.

Adenauer ordered contacts with Poland to pass off “practically unrecorded” (Skibowski). Even in his written report for Adenauer, Skibowski did not include any names: “They were only mentioned in discussions.”

Franz Josef Strauss only allowed Skibowski to address the army leadership on the situation in Poland on the condition there were “no names”.

“Ski” and his wife Gisela live in Sankt Augustin, surrounded by photos of numerous statesmen, including Adenauer, Ben Gurion and Kennedy.

“Ski” recalls: “It made sense to those in the know in Bonn and Poland that our circle of scouts should be tiny and that nearly everything should be kept secret. Our partners in Poland, on the other hand, had some freedom. One day, for example, the Primate of Poland sent me a specially made Masurian tapestry via a KLM crew, together with a ‘Thank You!’ What he was thanking me for of course remained unsaid.”

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Roland Freudenstein: 1988 – Silence before the Polish explosion Roland Freudenstein ran the Warsaw office of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation for a number of years after the fall of communism. He quickly became respected and popular. Even as a student in Bonn, he always had his eye on Poland: he learnt Polish and made Polish friends, with whom he used to discuss how Poland could escape the dilemma it found itself faced with as a result of communism. Roland Freudenstein’s experiences helped many western Christian Democrats find their way in Poland and promote realistic European policies. Today, Freudenstein runs the academic department of the political foundation at EPP headquarters in Brussels.

Roland Freudenstein

It is always easy to be wise after the event. Looking back, nothing could have turned out any different. But let us imagine for a moment we can go back in time. In early 1988, it was clear that there was something in the air in Central Europe, and yet nobody knew exactly what was going to happen. It had mainly to do with Gorbachev and his perestroika, but in Poland and Hungary it also involved the obvious failure of all attempts at reform within the “existing socialist reality”. In Poland, this development was seized with both hands.

I myself had already visited Poland 10 times, mostly for several weeks, always to meet contacts who were members of the opposition, several of whom had become personal friends. The country had barely recovered from the violent suppression of Solidarity in December 1981. Over the 1980s, it had become increasingly difficult to offer visible opposition, and sometimes the last activists were even pitied by their fellow citizens. At the same time, Poland had fallen into a frightening state of apathy.

Nowadays we can no longer imagine how poor the lack of consumer goods had made the Poles. Withdrawal from public life was the least harmful reaction. Alcoholism, juvenile delinquency, occultism and other attempts to escape reality all increased visibly. Anyone young and dynamic tried to get to the West – in other words Western Europe and often Germany – in any way possible. However, it was no longer as easy to secure political asylum as it had been during martial law at the beginning of the decade. And visa-free holiday travel and Erasmus programmes for students were distant “science fiction”. Young Poles found themselves working as builders, tradesmen and pot-washers in the literal sense of the word, but they nevertheless got a lot out of their time in the West, and not just in material terms. And they were accepted in Germany with more 45

sympathy than ten years later, when the cliché of car-stealing Poles became established …

1988 was a year of standstill and movement in Poland. The standstill was at first total, the movement still minimal and hesitant. The latter was the result of the belief that things could not continue as before. It was impossible to bring stability to society as a whole. Among my growing group of Polish friends living in exile in Germany, people were convinced in 1987-1988 that the situation east of the Iron Curtain could go one of two ways: reform or crackdown, in other words slow liberalisation or a neo-Stalinist destruction of the germinating opposition movements.

This was because, despite the stagnation, lots had been happening beneath the surface in Poland. Whereas, at the beginning of the decade, there had been broad opposition to General Jaruzelski and the communist PZPR party, in the second half of the 1980s, in spite of the apathy of the majority of Poles, non-governmental structures with a long-term focus had begun developing in small parts of society. A functioning underground press was producing products of increasing quality, in order to get around censorship. New discussion groups were being formed in the towns and cities, often with the support of committed Catholic priests and protected from the authorities. Everything of political importance began to be discussed from new viewpoints: the political and economic position of the country, the situation in the “socialist brother countries”, the development of perestroika, and of course, with never-waning enthusiasm, Polish history itself. Summaries of these debates were distributed time and again by the underground press.

It was around this time that self-critical views on subjects which had previously been taboo first started appearing, e.g. the expulsion of the Germans after 1944. German CDU/CSU sympathisers like me came across Poles who had been fundamentally disappointed by German social democracy and who were curious and often even well disposed towards us (provided one did not insist on the “1937 borders”, about which no-one in Poland agreed). Jan Maria Rokita was one of the WiP representatives (a conscientious objector, but in reality an opposition politician) with whom I held long discussions. An opposition landscape had thus developed in academic and church circles in Polish society, which, although it could not do anything on its own, was nevertheless ready to support Solidarity in the event of new worker protests. This time, Gorbachev’s Soviet Union would neither “save” the regime by means of military deployment, nor encourage it to sort things out once and for all, as was the case in 1981.

This was the hope that bordered on certainty, but nobody could be quite certain.

The first new strikes broke out on 21 April 1988 in Stalowa Wola in protest at the catastrophic economic and supply situation. The government was able to calm the situation down temporarily, but the whole 46

regime was clearly at a loss as to what to do next. The next wave of protests began on 15 August in Jastrzêbie, and soon included the shipbuilding industry in Gdañsk. This ended in official talks between Solidarity and the government, and resulted in the first breakthrough on the way to system change.

In the first half of 1988, I was busy with exams for my Master’s degree at the University of Bonn (the subject of my work was: “Polish Catholicism and the German Question 1965-1985”), but in the summer I was free to think about current events. The Konrad Adenauer Foundation, where I worked as a temporary employee during my exam period, sent me to Salzburg for a two-week international seminar organised by the German Marshall Fund in the first half of August. Even though they were more or less faithful to the regime, the delegates from Central and Eastern Europe were visibly nervous, and even admitted the desperate situation in their countries of origin in one-to-one conversations.

When the second wave of strikes broke out and could no longer be stopped by the regime, many Poles living in exile became active again.

My friends and I collected money to support the strikers. The developments in Poland gathered speed. On 30 November, there was an uncensored television debate between Lech Wa³êsa and Alfred Miodowicz, chairman of the OPZZ trade union, which was faithful to the regime. Even Poles loyal to the regime had to admit that Wa³êsa was the clear winner, as I myself was able to ascertain. I had travelled to Poland again to follow the rapid developments from close up. Kazimierz Wóycicki, who had been involved in Polish-German dialogue for three decades, was at the time one of my friends and my main discussion partner. When, on 18 December, a 100-strong citizens’ committee made up of academics and Catholic activists emerged from within the leadership of Solidarity to prepare for the later round table talks, it was clear that things would never be the same again.

One thing still needs to be cleared up: what was happening in the good old Federal Republic of Germany in 1988? “We” achieved our best ever result at Wimbledon. The perestroika look with buttonless jackets and icon aesthetics had taken over even the smallest provincial boutiques.

Perhaps there was another hostage drama on the TV, and the death of Franz Josef Strauss. Otherwise, there was not much to suggest that in a year’s time, Europe would be standing on its head. Any premonition of the end of an era? Not for the majority of West Germans. Nor was it much different in the rest of Western Europe. By the end of the year, however, the way had been opened and the stage set in the East. It was time for the peaceful revolution. Poland had made a start — as so often in Europe’s history of liberation…

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Karl Josef Hahn (1912 – 2001) “Henne” never gave up For decades, he was considered a Christian Democrat European par excellence, right across Europe and as far as Chile, even though he never founded a party, never sat in a parliament, and clearly never drove in a minister’s flagged car. Yet he “held office”, if one might describe his omnipresence thus, at 107 Via de Plebiscito in the centre Karl Josef Hahn of Rome for many years after the war.

In the General Secretariat of the European Christian Democrats, which gradually gained in significance. Nominally, he was a “deputy”, but in reality he pulled nearly all the strings, without drawing attention to himself.

Karl Josef Hahn, known affectionately as “Henne” in the Netherlands and beyond, was born on 10 November 1912 in Karlsbad in Bohemia, which at the time was part of Austro-Hungary. Not for much longer, as the First World War began in 1914. When it finally ended in 1918, “Henne” became a citizen of the newly-created Czechoslovakia, which began with crises and riots and ended on the eve of the next war in 1939, courtesy of Hitler. The world dodged the “Sudeten German question”.

Renate lived in Karlsbad. Her surname was also Hahn. When she married Karl Josef in 1935, the registrar was surprised, because she was Jewish and he was a Catholic. After marriage, they both went to Prague University. Hahn became a literary historian, and went to Heidelberg for a time, where he felt drawn to the young group around the magazine Hochland.

Hahn loved Rilke, but did his doctorate – which he was awarded in 1936 – on Stefan George. As he told friends later, Renate “gradually became Catholic”.

Then their happiness came to an end. Hitler pocketed Prague, and in 1938 it became dangerous for Jews there. The Hahn family moved to Bilthoven in the Netherlands, where “Henne” had made contacts as a student: he had got to know the Catholic trade unions and studied the Church’s code of social ethics during his time there. This was of use to him now in 1938, in the small town near Utrecht, where older CDA politicians still know of him now. During the war, a Calvinist baroness who was an acquaintance of Hahn’s father hid the Hahns together with their children. Unlike Anne Frank, the Hahns survived. Although they still had German passports, they began to feel more attached to their new homeland with each passing day.

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Karl Josef Hahn was involved in the European movement and with the Christian Democrats in his new homeland from the very beginning.

He met Konrad Adenauer at the legendary Hague Congress of Europe (1948), and helped him in a climate that was not favourable towards Germans. Then politics became a profession. For a while, Hahn worked in Germany’s US zone teaching German to GIs, but then “Europe called again”. Hahn ran the translation office of the new “European Union for Coal and Steel” in Luxembourg. His gift for languages was striking. In the end, he spoke German, Czech, Dutch, English, French, Italian and some Spanish.

Because of his wealth of contacts in Luxembourg, Hahn became interested in the cooperation of the Christian Democrat parties in Europe.

After improvising in Paris, these parties agreed on a headquarters in Rome.

This resulted in the General Secretariat of the “European Union of Christian Democrats” (EUCD). This was the first time that the parties of the six countries in particular that had set off together after the Schuman Declaration of 1950 were united, after many failed attempts.

Hahn was always involved in new political initiatives: he gave papers, wrote keynote speeches, and helped to found an organisation for Christian Democratic ex-politicians from Eastern Europe. An archive centre was developed, followed by the establishment of a parallel party alliance in Latin America (ODCA), and informal cooperation with Christian Democrats in more and more organisations.

Anyone who saw him in Rome was amazed. “Henne” was always efficient and on the move. After work, he mutated into a marvellous tour guide. The envy of many, the Hahns lived in a dream location on Piazza Navona, right in the centre of the city. “Henne” helped every visitor, aided not least by his legendary good memory.

When the Eastern Bloc began to soften, this caused serious problems for the EUCD headquarters in Rome. Exiled politicians from Poland or Hungary were at loggerheads with fellow citizens who had stayed in their homeland and become active there, e.g. in the Polish opposition movement Solidarity, which began as a trade union in 1980. Hahn also experienced the communist political machine trying to infiltrate the ranks of the Christian Democrats. Many people did not take this seriously; however, various unmasking operations in Rome in the last years, e.g. the unmasking of a Dominican in the Office for Polish Pilgrims as a top agent, showed that Hahn was right to be cautious.

The most difficult phase came after the fall of the Wall, i.e. during Hahn’s latter years, when he was also suffering from illness. This was when, for example, Polish politicians were trying to secure Roman intervention in order to block competition. Hahn helped implement the line of the EUCD majority: problems should be solved in Warsaw, Prague or Budapest, not “from above”, e.g. in Rome. He was right, and we have 49

numerous letters of his in which he skilfully refuses invitations to X or Y, blaming his workload.

For a few years, Hahn lived here and there. His second wife died.

In 1984, he finally plumped for Holland and became a naturalised citizen, even though he had listed “Netherlands” or “Holland” as his country of affiliation at conferences for years. His last epicentre was Bilthoven.

Hahn was in Prague briefly in 1964/65, during the Communist period, and sought out old friends. He fostered private relationships through Vienna, with the utmost caution. He knew Jiri Pelikan, who took up his seat in the Strasbourg Parliament as a Czech exile with a French passport. And he had a high regard for many people who had absolutely nothing to do with politics, which made him popular with some delegates in particular.

Hahn showed courage when money was tight. He could follow goals unwaveringly even when people said there was no money “for that”.

“Henne” was therefore clearly prepared to build all kinds of bridges with the East, on a personal level first and foremost. He did not visit Poland very many times, but he always kept an eye on the “state of affairs” there, using sources in Warsaw and the Vatican.

As for whether or not he was astonished by Poland’s self-liberation and the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1988/89, his friends do not know for sure, but they agree that Karl Josef Hahn was more optimistic than for example Willy Brandt or Margaret Thatcher.

Overall, “Henne” can be seen as personifying the three major phases in Christian Democratic politics with regard to Eastern Europe under the rule of the Kremlin: anti-communist tactics between 1948 and 1980, humanitarian aid and the establishment of democratic structures. One of his friends in Rome once asked jokingly, “How many visiting cards have you collected, is it 10,000 or 100,000?”

“Henne” died on 13 July 2001 in Bilthoven, which had taken him in in 1938. His interest in Christian Democratic politics never ended. He did a great service to the international work of the Christian Democrats in a period of history like no other.

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The travels of Dr. Egon A. Klepsch I have already looked at the factors that put Mikhail Gorbachev’s advisors in touch with new contacts in Western parliaments. The Soviet leadership began by sending an invitation to Dr Egon A. Klepsch, Chairman of the EPP Group in the European Parliament. Klepsch was also a member of the CDU Presidium. Klepsch accepted the invitation, having reached an agreement with the Group. In 1988, not long after the trip to Moscow, on which he was accompanied by the Group presidency, Klepsch made his first trip to Warsaw, during which the foundations were laid for more intensive contacts with the Polish opposition.

MOSCOW 1987 When Klepsch and the rest of the presidency arrived in Moscow on 16 March 1987, Tolkunov greeted him demonstratively as a “colleague”. Klepsch, a Sudeten German expelled in 1945 (about which Tolkunov had a file), introduced his vice presidents: Hanja Maij-Weggen (NL), Lambert Croux (B), Michel Debatisse (F), Giovanni Giavazzi (I) und Panajotis Lambrias (GR). Secretary General Sergio Guccione was also present.

The itinerary had been arranged in Brussels together with the Soviet Embassy. In Moscow, the delegation explained again that the German Embassy there was directly responsible for them, not because Klepsch was a German, but because Germany held the presidency of the Council of the European Union in Brussels for the first six months of the year. EPP members in the Eastern capitals continued to call for informal talks with the ambassadors of all EC – later EU – Member States, to be included in the programme.

The Russian side clearly mobilised large numbers of Gorbachev supporters and “technical intelligentsia”. They had agreed to tripartite talks in Brussels, along the lines of the three “CSCE baskets” (Helsinki Conference), so they began with “Security and Cooperation in Europe”. The Russians stressed again that the invitation had stemmed officially on their side from the “Committee for Security and Cooperation in Europe” (CSCE), and not from the Soviet parliament. It had been clear during the planning stages of the trip in Brussels that the Russians were also being cautious about what was taken down in the minutes.

They lied unashamedly, claiming that “their” organisation was autonomous and not paid for by the Soviet Union. In reality, it was paid for by the “World Peace Council” (based in Helsinki), which was run by the Kremlin and 75%-financed by the latter, and the dependent European committee had rented offices in Brussels and Prague. At the time, unfortu-

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nately, the left-wing “peace movement” had succeeded to some extent in luring left-wing Western Christian groups to join in the “fight against nuclear death”. They usually met in Brussels or Liège. The strongest group within the CSCE organisation was composed primarily of agents, along with disguised communist groups and trade union officials.

The hosts did not try to “upgrade” their followers in Helsinki or Brussels during Klepsch’s Moscow visit, although some EPP party politicians did crop up there from time to time. No, the Russians only wanted to debate “factual issues”. Evgeni Silin, vice president of the CSCE, was particularly concerned about disarmament, although he scarcely polemicised against the USA. He was supported by senior officials from the nuclear industry and the secretary general of the COMECON. The guests were amazed at the prominence given to the “friends from Brussels”. At least EPP officials were able to get hold of files about their Kremlin hosts prior to the trip, none of whom could be considered insignificant.

When Hanja Maij-Weggen complained at the lack of women on the Soviet side of the table, the hosts brought along a female teacher and member of the Russian parliament on the second day. She had the courage to acknowledge that she was always fetched by her bosses “in such cases”. On the second day, the hosts brought along foreign policy heavyweights from the Politburo like Vadim Sagladin, and even the seasoned Bonn visitor and US fan Georgii Arbatov. Arbatov was no Gorbachev fan, and liked to talk with Willy Brandt, and in particular with Egon Bahr, the verbose, non-progressive German Social Democrat. Arbatov changed his ideas, and was soon discussing détente at a CSCE spin-off conference in Belgium.

The EPP delegation knew what it wanted in the Kremlin. The Group had been discussing East-West problems with increasing frequency since 1979. It was therefore time to “weigh up” disarmament once and for all, according to Maij-Weggen. On the subject of human rights, Debatisse and Lambrias insisted on the background to the Helsinki policy, and called for changes to the Russian justice system. They also strongly criticised the Kremlin leadership for something that still goes on today: the persecution of journalists and writers. Unlike the European Social Democrats, the EPP delegates were not interested in making discreet “silent” complaints about injustices in Moscow. Foreign journalists in Moscow were amazed when they heard about the tone of the discussions.

On the third day, the same subjects were raised again, and even Tolkunov admitted that human rights were “important in the work of parliaments”. Interesting … More relaxed, the two groups then turned to the environment and scientific exchange. However, the discussions immediately turned sour each time the Russians raised the subject of European aid for their limping economy.

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This was not the only time that Klepsch reminded their hosts of the reason for their visit: “Cooperation with the European Community is only possible if you accept the EC (today: EU) as a subject of international law.

The same applies to parliaments.” Only then would „things” be more fruitful. „Parliaments?” The Russians knew very well that Klepsch was referring to the EU Parliament in Strasbourg in particular, at which they fell silent.

In those turbulent years, it was what happened “alongside” the itinerary on visits like the one in 1987 that was interesting, particularly in the evening. Then, the Russian hosts would moan about “a few reactionary groups” or “difficult Americans”. Surprisingly, we were still “guarded” during excursions and other activities, although not in the monastery at Zagorsk, where a priest said “things” were getting better “now”. “In the shops?”

“No, in the church”. Catholics like Klepsch asked in passing whether they could attend Holy Mass in Moscow’s small and only Catholic Church, which Charles de Gaulle and Konrad Adenauer had visited earlier. Even a “Klepsch mass” passed off without debate. The president still jokes about it today: „It was funny when the KGB officers accompanying us, who were dressed in civilian clothing, kept having to kneel down to pray so that they wouldn’t stand out.”

Tolkunov stood out in the evenings in particular, although in a pleasant way. He asked us to make allowances: “Journalists like us have to drink frequently, we’re on duty.” And then the reformist would become talkative, swaying more from one minute to the next. We confronted the hosts with a rumour that “Gorbi” was planning reforms, according to which the Soviet Union constituent states could choose to stay or “leave”. Despite the vodka, Tolkunov immediately stuck by his commander-in-chief, “Yes, we are planning something like that.” “Could countries like Armenia and Georgia leave, then?” “Of course, they could clear off.” We continued in English. “Could even a big country like Ukraine become independent?”

“Yes, in principle.” “And Poland?” “What do you mean, Poland? Poland has already gone, so has Hungary.”

“All of them, then?” “No, no, please not the three up there (he meant the three Baltic countries), otherwise there’ll be a row with the navy.”

Indeed, the fears about the Baltic States leaving were confirmed in 1991, when “Gorbi” ordered troops to open fire on a demonstration in Vilnius.

The man from the Kremlin had no success.

The visit to Moscow, which was later recorded in detail by the Group, was analysed in depth back in Strasbourg, and also in Bonn by a group including Chancellor Helmut Kohl. Klepsch thanked his friends: “Our hosts were struck by our closeness as a group and by our political consensus.

It was also right and proper that all our state ambassadors met with us in Moscow. The Russians admitted they had a lot to learn, e.g. that the EC is not a subsidiary of NATO. A few Russians, who had obviously never been 53

abroad, were particularly amazed that we urged the Red Army to pull out of Afghanistan. They thought Brussels was only concerned with butter mountains.”

Unfortunately, it was also clear that the Western media had succeeded in misrepresenting Brussels-based EC bodies even in Eastern Europe. As a result, the guests promised their Russian discussion partners up-to-date information about the EPP and the EPP Group.

One obstacle that came up over the course of the three days was the at times lively discussion on the subject of nuclear disarmament and medium-range missiles. The EPP delegation appreciated being taken very seriously, hearing complaints that disarmament talks with the Social Democrats and the Socialists were “much simpler”. Lambrias joked, “Please make a note of the fact that it’s the Christian Democrat governments who are growing in Europe, not the left.” When the vodka came out, the Greek tormented the Russians even more: “I used to be in charge of television in Athens, and was locked up by the right-wing colonels during the putsch.

I know all about dictatorships, but I also know what you can do to weaken them.”

The EPP parties saw their official Moscow trip as the first stage in a broad strategy. The trip to Poland by Italian friends (1987) “with their ‘International Christian Democrat/IDC’ hats on” was also first and foremost the beginning of a new type of exploration, aimed at developing from reconnaissance talks to concrete political consultation and aid.

The group that made the IDC trip was composed almost entirely of Italian Christian Democrats and a single, admittedly influential, Polish advisor, the exiled official Konrad Sieniewicz, now based in Rome.

Because of his position in Brussels, the German EPP Secretary General Thomas Jansen was also able to get involved in Rome, and to study the objectives of Sieniewicz’s Polish partners, who had until then been unknown to us. The fact that even the Polish president, General Jaruzelski, wanted to speak with IDC President Flaminio Piccoli showed the extent to which the IDC delegation was taken seriously by the communist establishment.

The EPP Group visit to Moscow, which had included politicians from six different countries, was proof again to the realists in Europe’s “Christian parties” that the Kremlin was still very much in control of the Cold War, albeit with less military involvement. No-one could have imagined that the process of disintegration in the communist-governed countries would accelerate so quickly and so effectively.

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WARSAW 1988 I helped plan Egon Klepsch’s trips to Poland and travelled with him

In April 1987, I received a telephone call in Bonn. On the other end of the line was the most senior secret agent at the Polish Embassy, at that time in Cologne. In his role as “diplomat”, Dr Stanis³aw Cholewiak, whom I had known for two years, conveyed the “excitement” of Politburo member Mieczys³aw Rakowski in Warsaw, “You are a close friend of Dr Klepsch, who went to Moscow, aren’t you? Would he also accept an invitation to the Polish Sejm?” “Why not!?” There followed talks and exploratory discussions, which unexpectedly dragged on until May 1988, and then, surprisingly, led to an extended trip to Poland.

What was the motive of the Polish leadership? Firstly, they had analysed our East-West debates, knew about the Moscow trip, and had drawn their own conclusions. For example, the Poles “had no problem with recognising the EC under international law”. Secondly, Warsaw wanted any kind of help, and even a minister confessed that Poland was by then “just a few metres away from economic bankruptcy”. Thirdly, they recognised that there was no way back for Poland after 1980, with its strikes and signs of democracy on the horizon.

On 27 April 1987, I wrote to Cholewiak to inform him that President Klepsch would appoint an EPP Group representative to plan the Poland trip. The appointment was a political test, since Klepsch chose Siegbert Alber from Stuttgart, vice president of the European Parliament. The CDU MEP had founded the afore-mentioned association “Amici Poloniae” in the European Parliament together with his British Conservative colleague Robert Battersby, with the aim of publicly providing humanitarian aid to Poland, which had suffered under martial law since 1981. The Polish Embassy in Cologne bought Alber as a planner, on Warsaw’s instructions.

The trip was largely planned by me, in agreement with Alber, Rakowski’s office, various diplomats in Warsaw, the Polish Catholic church, and of course friends who were also representatives of the popular movement Solidarity, which was still banned. On behalf of Klepsch, we informed Rakowski, who was also vice marshal of the Sejm at the time, that Klepsch would not be able to bring a large delegation to Poland until the end of June 1987. Later, in the winter of 1987/1988, there were new problems on the Polish side, which meant that we were not actually able to fly until 19 June 1988. Our main contact, Warsaw journalist Andrzej Kostarczyk, told me later that the delay was also due to the fact that the EPP had been trying to establish contact with people, “the mere mention of whom provoked fear and irritation in Warsaw”. For example, we wanted to choose our own Church partners.

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As already mentioned, by 1987 the group had been interested in Poland for many years, and had even devoted long study days to looking at the country. Its interest had in the meantime become focused on four areas: 1) Does Poland, like the Soviet Union, desire real reforms that will have a positive effect on the economy, and can it achieve them without complete political change? 2) Can the broad popular movement Solidarity become a viable structure that will be able to find its way towards democracy and be tolerated by Moscow? 3) Will the EPP and its members be able to find partners in Poland, and eventually democratic parties with whom they can be on close terms? 4) Does the Republic of Poland want to be a member of the EC, and should it be a member?

The Group chairman planned his Poland delegation based on the model of the Moscow trip, since the idea to bring along several Group vice presidents had proved a good one. This succeeded with just one exception: Vice President Roberto Formigoni (DC Italy) replaced Giovanni Giavazzi. As well as our Secretary General, we also took along two advisors.

We were met in Warsaw on June 19 by a Sejm representative and the German ambassador, since “Bonn” was the “power” behind the EC Council in the first half of 1988. After initial talks with Sejm delegates from all parties and a short meeting with Rakowski – “We’ll meet properly later!” – there followed on the Sunday a meeting with the “Dziekania group” in Warsaw’s old town. This club of political dissenters had been “kick-started” by Professor Stanis³aw Stomma (he preferred not to say “founded”).

(For an interview with Andrzej Kostarczyk on this, see p. 113) The Catholic legal scholar Stomma was the only Polish MP to abstain from voting to amend the Polish Constitution to make the country more dependent on Moscow, something for which he gained international renown. He led the independent Catholic ZNAK group in the Sejm for many years, and worked tirelessly to reach agreement with the Germans, particularly the Christians, from 1958 onwards. The “Dziekania group” was a “typical Stomma creation”, according to Adam Michnik, whom Poland has to thank for the first large opposition newspaper Gazeta Wyborza, which he still runs. Apparently, Stomma was not just good at fighting the communists, he was also good at stemming “adventurism on the fringes of Solidarity”, “violence against Russians”, and even “doubts about excessively large demonstrations by the opposition”.

One day, after the black year of 1981, when on 13 December the government imposed martial law and banned political opposition, Stomma came to the conclusion that democracy would only be possible in Poland if people “talked more and fought less”. He feared left-wing tendencies and even syndicalism in the popular Solidarity movement, could see the beginnings of antagonism even against the Church, but was also mistrustful of West European-style parties. At the same time, he mentioned in discussions that he would like to see a democratic Poland with 56

Janusz Reiter (left) and Andrzej Kostarczyk (right) helped shape the DZIEKANIA group. EPP exponent Elmar Brok (far right) helped build the new bridges. Trust was growing even before the fall of communism.

a sense of community, and that he provided political support to young activists with Church connections, whom he believed should be thinking about sustainable balanced power structures. The EPP delegation even heard that these discussions were mentored by Bishop Jerzy D¹browski, not far from the cathedral of the Primate of Poland. Jerzy D¹browski was after all Deputy Secretary General of the Bishops’ Conference with responsibility for foreign contacts, until his accidental death. This was significant, and even Janusz Reiter, Poland’s first ambassador to Bonn after 1989, was a member of the “Dziekania” club.

Our talks with activists from the group aged between thirty and forty soon showed that some came from different Catholic associations and some did not. Some had only begun to think about doing something for the democratisation of Poland since the beginning of the strike movement. Most of them could speak a foreign language. When the guests explained why they had founded the transnational EPP, and the extent to which national Christian Democratic parties in the West could – and had to - have the same opinion about European matters, we learned that the members of the Polish group ranged from party-opponents (“We definitely don’t want Western-style parties!”) to circles that had been planning parties for a long time, including some who wanted a “Christian Democrat” party. The extent to which the Church would be involved in any planning, or whether it would be involved at all, remained unclear. Only a few speakers emphasised later on, over a beer, that they were following the Western model, for example that of the Benelux Christian Democrats or the Italian Christian trade unions.

The climate of the discussions was outstanding; nobody avoided difficult problems. However, nothing was said about Germany’s eastern border, and this remained the case until the end of the visit. The delegation, which included three Germans, felt this was sensible. Everyone could see straightaway that we were looking to the future, and wanted political partners. Everyone was aware that, since 1980, Poland’s position had developed into a problem between Moscow and the West, and that the Polish Pope believed the continent should and would soon “breathe with both lungs, not just one (the Western one)”. One evening in the German 57

Michel Debatisse (F), Egon Klepsch (D), Sergio Guccione (I), Roberto Formigioni (I), Lambert Croux (B), Hanja Maij-Weggen (NL), Siegbert Alber (D) and Panayotis Lambrias (GR,) paying tribute to the murdered priest Jerzy Popie³uszko in Warsaw.

embassy, Egon Klepsch told a few EC diplomats, “We understood. The Church values people who mediate between the fronts, but it doesn’t impose itself on any front.”

Until our visit, “Dziekania” had not made a clear impression on the Polish regime, and at first our visit was viewed – completely incorrectly – as just an act of homage to the anti-communist Stomma. On 11 August 1988, “Dziekania” received state recognition. Nobody saw this as a coincidence. Andrzej Kostarczyk and his friends read it as an encouragement to form a “Christian” party, and EPP Secretary General Thomas Jansen invited Kostarczyk to the next EPP conference in Luxembourg. In retrospect, there is no doubt that our visit to “Dziekania” was the first concrete step on the way to a real party partnership in Poland. What kind of a partnership? Nobody knew that yet.

On the second day of the visit, it became clear to us that everything might not go as harmoniously as planned. This was because the “partners” in the Sejm decided to change a significant part of the programme: the delegation was no longer allowed to visit Wa³êsa in Gdañsk. Hanja Maij-Weggen would represent Egon Klepsch in Gdañsk, semi-privately but accompanied by colleagues. The president had decided instead to go to Lublin. The hosts inserted other gaps into the programme, but we welcomed this and used the time to make improvised political contacts.

On 20 June 1988, we visited the church of St Stanislaus Kostka in Warsaw, where the young priest Jerzy Popie³uszko (1947-1984) worked until he was murdered by police from the interior ministry. Egon Klepsch laid a wreath on the grave of the young man, who is today honoured throughout Poland and the world, mainly by Christians. According to a priest who showed us round the church in which Popie³uszko used to preach, few Poles had “damaged the communists as much as this martyr”. His “Masses for the Fatherland”, in particular, had attracted more and more visitors to the district of ¯oliborz. We also found out that not everyone agreed with Popie³uszko’s actions: Cardinal Primate Józef Glemp tried to stifle him, and only allowed him to be buried in the immediate vicinity of “his” church after protests.

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The believers loved Jerzy Popie³uszko then, and continue to remain faithful to him today. This is evident in and around the church, from the crosses made by children, the photos of the hero with Wa³êsa and the Pope, flags and designs for monuments, but in particular the wreck of the car the victim was travelling in on the day he was killed, which the murderers had dumped in a lake.

Bearing in mind the background, the visit to the grave was not a matter of course, quite the opposite. A few Western politicians invited by Poland, in particular left-wingers, went out of their Egon Klepsch way to avoid the visit, while others, e.g. Hans-Di- at the grave etrich Genscher and EPP co-founder Leo Tindemans, who was at the time Belgian foreign minister, made a point of visiting the grave, purposely taking along journalists. This is in contrast to Willy Brandt, who accepted an invitation from the dictatorial Polish leadership in 1985.

However, the EPP delegation did not visit the Katyn Memorial Stone, which stands in a central cemetery as a reminder of the murder of Polish officers by Stalin’s henchmen in Katyn Forest in 1940. We had been begged by diplomats not to go, as a visit by the EPP to the memorial would damage confidential and perhaps serious talks between a number of Soviets and Polish “reformers”. We did not believe it, but kept away, at least officially. Three delegates and I paid a visit to the Katyn Memorial in private.

In 1988, the political wind had turned perceptibly. There was not the same pressure I had felt on my first visit to Poland in 1969. One consequence of this was that the Polish side did not interfere with our contacts or “private visits”. They restricted themselves at most to “critical remarks” or the judgement that this or that Pole was “acting alone” and was therefore not in the least important. We listened and then ignored their advice.

We did not agree to forego a joint trip to Gdañsk without protest. Egon Klepsch told the hosts in no uncertain terms that we were already annoyed whilst planning the trip that the Warsaw government had banned Lech Wa³êsa from visiting us in Warsaw. A friendly Sejm member then brushed the matter aside with a typical neo-Polish policy explanation, “Next time you come, Wa³êsa will be able to travel everywhere.” A gift of prophecy …

Waiting in a room of the Sejm, we also received a man shoehorned into the programme from on high and presented to as a Europe expert: Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, today a prominent Polish MEP, well-known not only in Brussels. At the time, he was just an unknown Mr X so far as we were concerned, and the delegation kept its cards close to its chest.

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After all, the communists were in power, and the man introduced to us was doing the groundwork for the government. We wondered where he stood politically.

He gave us a sort of answer after a few introductory sentences, and managed to create a frosty atmosphere straight away. He finished by painting a gloomy picture of the Polish economy: “The English and the French betrayed us in 1939, then the Germans tried to wipe us out. So it is up to Germany, England and France to rebuild Poland and to pay for it.” Klepsch whispered, “Be careful, he doesn’t know who we are.” Lambrias hissed, “What kind of Poland does he want us to build now?” Hanja Maij-Weggen really took the biscuit when she told the speaker, “You haven’t asked for any money from the Netherlands. I’m going shopping now, and as we all know, I’m still going to Gdañsk.” The “talks” with the guest, whose profession we were not told, ended in standoffish platitudes. Egon Klepsch, always keen to reach a compromise, left Saryusz-Wolski, today a PO politician, with the words, “We have a lot to learn from one another in Europe. We wish you all the best.” In retrospect, we can all see, including Saryusz-Wolski, that it was worth our while to learn from one another.

We could still take our irritation out on Sejm Marshal Roman Malinowski.

The corpulent leader of the agrarian bloc party ZSL, which was mollycoddled by the communists, quickly shook his guests’ hands in his office and, armed with a sheaf of papers, launched into a speech about the supposed progress in agriculture. After a few minutes, a member of the delegation interrupted him and asked the interpreter, “I would like to know whether it is still the case that more than one third of milk goes off in the countryside because of broken refrigeration or a complete lack of refrigeration.”

Malinowski, who had begun to sweat, broke off his speech with the words, “You clearly know enough about it”, and suggested we move straight on to drinks. Later inquiries provided us with proof of the large-scale corruption of the ZSL, from which its leader was benefiting too. One year later, I learnt that ZSL bigwigs had received big new Soviet limousines.

Michel Debatisse tormented Malinowski with the question of whether he thought the farmers’ union “Rural Solidarity” would get into bed politically with his bloc party, if it was authorised again. Malinowski shrugged his shoulders, avoided the question and asked Klepsch for support for his plan to hold a meeting of the parliaments of all Western and Eastern CSCE states in Warsaw. Our president joked, “All meetings that serve peace and prosperity are good - particularly when they allow all opinions to be heard.” And of course such a thing would only work if the European Parliament was also involved. He was curious. We remembered: Tolkunov had pressed ahead with his parliamentary assessment one year earlier, now Poland was simply following the Soviets. Nevertheless, even then, journalists in places like Hamburg were writing for the umpteenth time about Poland’s latest “détente proposal”.

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A few of the delegation’s talks were like egg-and-spoon races. We met people from the Church who were also advisors to the dictator General Wojciech Jaruzelski, journalists who said what the general wanted them to say, and Catholic Sejm members, whose opinions on internationally-known activists from the popular Solidarity movement, and particularly on friends like Tadeusz Mazowiecki and Bronis³aw Geremek, were incendiary and often hard to listen to. After all, everyone we talked to knew which Poles EPP politicians had been friends with for years. This applied in particular to Italian, German, Austrian and Benelux politicians. We had known for years that we would step on minefields in Catholic Poland. Some of us were prepared, but not necessarily for the extent of the problem.

For example, I was asked whether the delegation would like to meet Janusz Zablocki and a few officials from the pro-government Catholic group ODiSS, and I accepted without comment, although we all knew there would be no real significance to the meeting. We had known for a long time that a supposed recommendation of Zablocki people by Cardinal Primate Stefan Wyszyñski contained in ODiSS texts intended for the West was a huge lie. Back in 1973, the Primate had said to me, “So long as the communists are in power, the Church will seek to protect whatever is truthful and works publicly for faith and a fair social order, but we don’t favour anybody, including those Catholic delegates in the Sejm who are tolerated rather than valued by the communists.” One of the Primate’s confidants described to me the Church’s occasional dealings with ODiSS as “tactically important”.

The church rejected the efficient, pro-communist, pseudo-Catholic PAX group, which had been set up in the 1950s, and which had satellite groups both inside and outside the Sejm. No democratic Catholic groups were formed before 1956. Unfortunately, these groups fought among themselves later on. This was another reason why the delegation was particularly looking forward to its visit to the “Club of Catholic Intelligentsia” (KIK) near Copernicus Square in Warsaw.

The place was crammed full of people. Friendly speakers were more cautious in their political addresses than we had expected. They avoided expressing radical points of view, except of course the fact that “everyone” should be in favour of a united Europe. Created by whom? “We don’t know yet.” It became clear that our Polish friends had problems with “Brussels”, both then and in the rapprochement phase. The EC was seen, even by critics of the regime, as being nothing more than a totally economic machine without a political soul, dependent on NATO and the USA, even weaker than the Council of Europe founded in 1949. Although Polish Catholics accepted the existence of the European Parliament, which was elected by the people for the first time in 1979, it was nevertheless seen as a weak and empty backdrop between diplomats, big business, and the media circus.

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The talks in the Warsaw KIK were consequently theoretical and polite; nevertheless, Western diplomats still considered this club more important than five similar clubs in other Polish cities. However, the KIKs were often examples of a particular kind of political tragedy, which was also evident in the GDR and Hungary: they provided thinking people, including Christians, with a source of theories, but that was unfortunately not enough. This was because they could not achieve anything in public, nor could they really set up an authentic party, at least not if they wanted to be shrewd. As a result, they lost support after the fall of communism, both temporarily and permanently, because they were no longer useful as refuges.

Back at the hotel after visits like the one to the KIK, we would discuss the need to recognise the truth that, even in Poland, the communists had succeeded to some extent in painting a false picture of “our” Europe. The effects of the smear campaign lasted for some years after 1989. It was these considerations that led to the initial plans of the Robert Schuman Foundation, which was founded by the EPP Group in 1989, to become involved in shaping Polish opinion on European political matters, by producing its own publications. Most of these publications were only written for Polish readers, and complemented thanks their European federalist spirit some documents published by national foundations.

During the visit to the Club of Catholic Intelligentsia, as on later visits during other trips to the KIKs in Krakow and Wroc³aw, it became clear to the EPP politicians that communists were beating time by permitting a few Catholic clubs which were, intellectually and morally strong, because in communist times, no factory managers, officers, bankers, planning bureaucrats or other power-bearers could attend them, nor would they want to. Either such people were not Christian in their thinking, or they were concerned about their careers under the (later setting!) red sun. And the religious club members? Because of the tactical behaviour of those in charge of the country, they did not have a sufficiently accurate picture of the political realities around them, particularly in the case of Western Europe.

I cannot forget my late friend Zbigniew Gumbrycht, who lived in Warsaw. Like me, he was an engineer and born in 1929. He complained, “I’m the only engineer in the Catholic Intelligentsia Club, so I have scientific and technical training, but I’m surrounded by writers, poets, fascinating philosophers and good Polish historians, all of whom are seldom able to go abroad.” He joked that his thinking lay “somewhere between the spirit of the clubs and the ideas of technocratic communists, whose power is decreasing in this climate of moderate reform”. This friend introduced me to the complicated world of Christian Poles, about whom he said, “They have suffered all different kinds of foreign rule, but at least it’s made them fit. Now all they need are experts to tell them where to run.” As someone 62

who knew Moscow, he was convinced as early as 1985 that the communist empire “wouldn’t last until 2000 and was already crumbling”. He was angered by the Swiss technicians he was advising because, he said, “these people think Stalin’s descendants will never give up”.

The delegation was very impressed by the climate in the KIK, and of course knew that Tadeusz Mazowiecki, Wa³êsa’s main advisor, was prominent in the club and had previously been part of the ZNAK group in the Sejm. The Germans had met Mazowiecki at “Pax Christi” conferences, and not least at the Catholic congress Katholikentag. He was also liked and respected by the Christian Democrats in Vienna. Erhard Busek, Austrian vice chancellor between 1991 and 1995, paid tribute to his Polish friend in his book Projekt Mitteleuropa, which was published in 1997. Germans and Austrians in particular told friends in the EPP how they viewed Mazowiecki, which led the delegation to consider the Pole, who became the first democratic Polish prime minister overnight in 1988, to be their top discussion partner, and what is more they wanted to show this “to the other side”. Whether his “best bet was the left-wing Dutch Christian Democrats, and that at a push”, according to the speculation and polemicising taking place in Bavarian CSU circles, we considered completely irrelevant in 1988.

We had not (yet) talked seriously with Mazowiecki about setting up parties. However, we knew his key sentences from interviews: “I’m a Christian and a democrat. So why do I need to become a Christian Democrat? I don’t get it.” There was, therefore, a sort of “provisional answer”. As far as our delegation was concerned in 1988, we were interested in Mazowiecki’s high national status and his influence as a political leader and probably an intellectual prophet.

To make a point, our delegation dined with the visionary Mazowiecki in a well-known restaurant in Vilanov near Warsaw, accompanied by friends of ours who were also journalists. The delegation wanted to demonstrate this kind of fellowship to the outside world, and did so with others as well as Mazowiecki, who declaimed loudly on the political situation in between the soup and meat courses. We repeated this performance in places like the dining room of the Hotel Victoria, where we asked Jacek Czaputowicz, the leader of the “Freedom and Peace” movement (“Wolnoœæ i Pokój” – WiP), for an after-dinner speech “on the student situation”, and for his opinion on the murder of the priest Jerzy Popie³uszko.

Today, Czaputowicz, who was born in 1956, is a Professor of Economics and one of many Poles who are convinced Europeans. Back then, his group lent its support to conscientious objectors, and was persecuted as a result. When we met him, he had already been in prison, and 300 of his people had received sentences. Our delegation said publicly to Jacek that EPP parties supported military NATO defence but also the rights of conscientious objectors. We made a note of the fact that Cardinal Józef Glemp 63

had spoken out against “Freedom and Peace”. He still believed in military service in 1988.

The eight hard-working waiters who served us at the Hotel Victoria were amazed at the speaker and his prominent, multi-national friends.

One of them made notes in the background. That is what I had hoped would happen. The police would know which foreigners were siding with Czaputowicz and the WiP. As expected, the discussion with Mieczys³aw Rakowski turned out to be the political highpoint of the visit. At the time, he was still vice marshal of the Sejm. In 1988, Jaruzelski made him prime minister, and the failed reformer went on later to dissolve his party. I had known him for a long time and was aware of how complicated and clever he was.

I sensed that his communist ideal consisted of freedom of opinion for those in charge and dictatorship for the stupid masses. Nevertheless, his memoirs should be taken seriously, since he was less inclined to lie than other Polish communists. It is worth remembering that in Germany, Rakowski inspired fierce admiration among the political opponents of Adenauer and Kohl, from Countess Dönhoff to Egon Bahr, not to mention Stern and Der Spiegel. Anyone who met friends of Rakowski’s in Bonn would think that the biggest liberal on the Vistula was unfortunately never really given a chance.

This politicising journalist made a point of not receiving us in the Sejm, although he was vice marshal at the time, but at the headquarters of the Polish United Workers’ Party, a big, grey, ugly building near the Poniatowski Bridge, home to major banks since the fall of communism. Flanked by young officials, Rakowski sat in the middle of a long table, opposite Egon Klepsch and the “Brussels” delegation, looking grumpy and tired.

He had been fully briefed about our visit to the night shift at the „Ró¿y Luksemburg” lamp factory in the district of Wola the night before, where we had gone with some of our friends from the Dziekania group, and received a round of applause from a crowd of listeners. He even had photographic evidence to back it up.

Before this factory visit, which was undoubtedly provocative, we had visited a presbytery for dinner quite late in the evening, and were given an introduction to the “situation of the workers”. Wola has a long and painful political history: after the last Warsaw Uprising, for example, more than ten thousand surviving Poles were murdered there by Latvian SS officers. Several houses bear plaques in memory of underground fighters executed by Germans. The situation was still political in Wola. The priest told us: “Hardly anyone voted in the local elections recently. There’s no point since they’re faked anyway.”

The first row of seats in the large assembly hall of the Ró¿y Luksemburg building was filled with older workers who had Solidarity stickers on their blue overalls. One of our Polish friends introduced us, thanking us 64

profusely for the help provided by free Europe since 1980. An unknown person filmed us from a ladder. We allowed him to.

The gathering was addressed not by chairman Egon Klepsch but by the Greek EPP Group Vice President Panayotis Lambrias from Athens, who was well prepared. He pledged “our further active solidarity”, and mentioned that not only had he lost his as job of head Athens television as a result of the putsch by the Greek colonels, but that he had also ended up in prison. Lambrias raised his voice: “My dear friends, I therefore know all about dictatorships and social oppression. That is why we are here, to talk about the free part of Europe, which you will one day be part of.

Poland has after all always belonged to Europe.”

Rakowski was obviously aware of what had happened the night before and bit his lip. We could see the pressure he was under because of the precarious state of the country. He quickly began to criticise the socalled “Paris Club”, which was considering debt relief and the problems of new lines of credit for Poland: “They talk, but they don’t do anything”.

Who was he referring to? He moved on to the topic of reforms, but did not lie as much as Poland’s government spokesman Jerzy Urban: “We’re sitting tight, we’re not making any progress, but that damages you too.”

When he stopped to draw breath, it was the most politically charged moment of the whole EPP trip.

Egon Klepsch pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and read from it: “Mr Rakowski, I have here the names and addresses of five students from Wroc³aw who are currently behind bars. They will be in court next Monday. All five are innocent. They have only called for Host M. Rakowski, helpless in the end the sort of freedoms that the East and the West have been discussing since the Helsinki meetings. My delegation and the Christian Democrats of Europe therefore expect these young people to be set free now, i.e. immediately.” Roberto Formigoni took the piece of paper round to the other side of the table and Rakowski put it in his jacket and continued talking about everything that „the” West was doing wrong. Egon Klepsch pushed a piece of paper around among our delegation that said, “I’m going to come back to this”.

Five minutes later, he got down to business: “You’ve got the names in your pocket, but we don’t yet know what you’re actually going to do.

I repeat: you must act now.” Red in the face and silent, Rakowski passed the piece of paper to his neighbour, who disappeared quickly out of the room. The debate was quickly wearing thin.

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Soon after, we met Politburo member Józef Czyrek, and talked with him for half an hour. Czyrek was and still is important for the EPP, as he was the semi-official member in charge of talks with the church. He had countless reform ideas, some of them good, but he could not imagine leaving the communists, and the meeting ended in platitudes.

We were finally escorted through the ostentatious building to the exit, where our minibus was waiting. As Klepsch began to descend the steps outside the building, a young man in priest’s clothing ran up from the side and shouted: “The five in Wroc³aw have just been sent home. I heard the news on the telephone. Thank you so much!”

We had been given the five names the day before at the Catholic University in Lublin (KUL), where opposition activists had known about the planned EPP visit for a long time. As we learnt later, the release of the five had a profound effect on the complicated situation of the opposition in the Lublin area, but also at the university itself. Declared opponents of Warsaw became stronger than the manoeuvres in the university.

We knew that the teaching staff at the KUL had very different political opinions even before we visited. A few professors criticised the Solidarity underground as a “rashly aggressive clique”, while others were proud of the strong underground press present in the Lublin area. The German GFPS (Society for the Support of Polish Students in Germany), founded by the Karlsruhe-based Christian Democrat Georg Ziegler, had the best reputation among students, and had led to the development of a whole network of relationships. Everyone in the GFPS believed in democracy, and a few were also somewhat critical of the church. I addressed the KUL during our visit, and when I suggested that the church would have to take a step back if the country became democratic, as happened in Spain after Franco’s departure, the students terrified the professor present, Joachim Kondziela, by stamping their feet in approval for several minutes.

Kondziela had had political connections to the Catholic Church in Western Europe for many years, and once said to me that conservative Catholics should “get along and reconcile interests with reform communists”. By way of diplomatic response, a Dominican who worked in the KUL library once told me in private: “I have a poison cabinet in the library. It contains dangerous books by Hans Küng and Leon Trotsky, and Kondziela is happy about that, because the imprisonment of Küng is good for the church, and the absence of Trotsky is good for sensible communists.”

In the summer of 1989, the West found out from reliable sources that Kondziela had been cooperating with two members of the Polish secret service for years. I heard that Primate Stefan Wyszyñski had known about Kondziela’s role from an early stage, and that Kondziela was not the only man Wyszyñski was watching. A KUL professor explained the Kondziela connection as follows: “We had to cooperate with the state during the 66

good times and the bad times, otherwise we wouldn’t have had any cement and tiles here, for example, not to mention professor visas for abroad.

As I’m sure you know, we had elections recently, and all the bishops abstained, at Glemp’s request, with two exceptions. One was our bishop here, whom the KUL trusts. With cement and visas …” Another exception was Kondziela, who became one of General Jaruzelski’s advisors after 1981.

Soon, however, the EPP had a much bigger problem, namely the rapid drop in the political share price of liberals and Christian Socials at the KUL after 1989. Professor Ryszard Bender, who expressed ultra-conservative views in 1988, further entrenched his position as the darling of the rightwing clerics when he opposed the European Christian Democrats and supported the Kaczyñski twins in their “anti-Lisbon” stance. In 1990, he became an advisor to Jaros³aw Kaczyñski. Describing himself as an “independent conservative”, he later worked hard in the Senate, and was elected to the list of the Kaczyñskis’ PiS party. This proved too pro-European for him, and in 2008, in advance of the 2009 European Parliament elections, he joined the list of the radical anti-European party LIBERTAS, which received money from mysterious sources, e.g. the USA, and tried in vain to entice Ireland out of the EU. Bender had been part of the ZNAK group when it was still intact under Stomma, and did not stand out as a right-winger. It is not clear what caused him to change position so radically later on. All I know is he was always scared of the Russians, and did not consider “Brussels” capable of protecting Poland. I am also mentioning Bender as an example of difficult territory for Lublin and KUL. This is not in any way at odds with Helmut Kohl’s honorary doctorate from Lublin or the good relationships that CDU Secretary General Bruno Heck built up with the KUL and Kondziela when he was Chairman of the Adenauer-Stiftung, which were aimed primarily at helping students.

By 1990, when the problem of “EPP partners in Poland” arose, the situation in Lublin had changed compared with the years before 1981, when, for example, talks with the former political underground in southern and southeast Poland had to bypass Eurosceptic members of the KUL professorial staff. The Robert Schuman Foundation can be proud today of having achieved something in Lublin, e.g. the involvement of former stagiaire Tomasz Rósniak in founding the European foundation “Nowy Staw”, which serves the young generation and is active worldwide.

The delegation combined its visit to Lublin and talks at KUL with a commemoration of the victims of Nazi rule. They had decided not to visit Kraków or Auschwitz, because the party leadership “did not want to follow the usual Poland itinerary” (Egon Klepsch), but “would like to meet students in the provinces, for example”, and not just in Warsaw. We had decided back in Brussels to visit Majdanek concentration camp, which was on the outskirts of Lublin, and which the Pope had also visited.

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The Belgian “Berti” Croux told me he would never forget the visit to Majdanek. He carried the president’s wreath to the huge bowl containing human ashes that stood on a hill in the centre of the camp. It was raining.

A historian described how Mozart was played through loudspeakers while the SS carried out mass shootings, which were perpetrated as far as Majdanek in 1942; this was painful for all of us to listen to, and no-one spoke until the end of the tour. Later, a Polish friend expressed her astonishment: “That’s the first time I’ve seen Germans and other Europeans mourning together in Majdanek.” What has been passed on? Fear of political routine…

The trip to Poland ended with individual talks in Warsaw, not to mention the report by Hanja Maij-Weggen and her colleagues on their visit to Wa³êsa, who was apparently “very optimistic”. There was no shortage of “plans for the future”. We focused on the connection between the EPP Group and people with Christian Democrat tendencies in the Dziekania group, and in particular on the relationship with Jan Koz³owski, a farmers’ leader active in southern Poland, whose daughter worked at the KUL. Her name is Jolanta Koz³owska and today she holds the position of Polish Consul General in Cologne.

We did not establish a relationship with the small Catholic group in the Sejm that had illegally appropriated the name “ZNAK Group”. The EPP delegation did not want to remain in contact with such Poles, who were only interested in setting up parties. One exception to this rule was Kostarzcyk and his small group. We told the members of the Sejm, regardless of which ruling party they came from, that the EPP Group was interested in an exchange of experience concerning European affairs, but that it was necessary to wait for better conditions. All the same, when it returned to the Parliament, the EPP Group described the visit as a “Polish model for relations with the West”.

Klepsch told the media that discussions had been “open and matter-offact” and that the Poles took Western economic help seriously, but that they had to wait and see whether the outcome was going to be any better than under previous Warsaw governments. On the subject of state and church aid for agriculture, Klepsch emphasised the need for those calling for agricultural aid to be treated equally. Individual farmers should be offered the same help as state farmers. Moreover, Klepsch said, they expected the ban on opposition to be lifted, and the introduction of democratic laws concerning clubs and associations. Klepsch added that disarmament had been discussed, but restated the widely held Western position that responsibility for this lay with the Soviet Union in particular.

The delegation expressed its regret at Polish misconceptions concerning the European communities, even among the country’s most senior officials. It would be hard to advance without proper understanding, the delegation said.

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On his return to Brussels, Klepsch sent striking letters of thanks to Poland. He thanked the KUL for its plan of creating a Europe Institute. He expressed his admiration for Danuta Winiarska, who was at the time an underground leader in Lublin and who later married Jacek Kuroñ, calling her “a very significant figure”, and asked her to join him as he placed his hope in “Christian principles”. Mazowiecki and Kostarczyk received the longest letters. We wanted to make a public show of reverence for one, and we had given the other a lot of work, for which we were grateful. We were especially grateful to our interpreter Paulina Fedak, who was exceptionally conscientious and empathetic.

WARSAW 1994 When Egon Klepsch returned to Poland six years later, in 1994, the political scene had changed significantly, and in some cases dramatically. Klepsch was by then no longer EPP Group chairman, but had been president of the European Parliament since 1992.

This time, the invitation came from Józef Oleksy, marshal of the Sejm and former communist. Immediately after greeting Klepsch in his office, he made his intentions clear: “We want to join Europe, and it seems to be working.” Approval from his colleague in Brussels and an assessment of the situation. Stanis³aw Szymanski, whom we had met in 1988 when he was a member of the old agrarian party, was now deputy foreign minister.

Poland was being ruled by a complex coalition of Neo-Social Democrats and reformed farmers. The prime minister was the young rising star Waldemar Pawlak, who also came from a farming background. Today, he is Donald Tusk’s deputy and also Minister for Economic Affairs.

Oleksy demonstrated his personal interest in Europe, spoke some German and English, praised Helmut Kohl as a friend of Poland, thanked us for the Schuman Foundation grants, and made it clear that he always made a point of attending Sejm committee meetings when they were on the subject of Europe. One day, we even saw him in Brussels. He was leading the Polish delegation in the “Convention” presided over by Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, which eventually became – after a lot of moaning and groaning – the “Lisbon EU”. And when the EPP held a conference in Warsaw in 2009, Poland’s top politicians were celebrating their “5th Anniversary of EU Membership”, in the presence of President J. M. Barros and with Polish and EU flags, in the hall next door, with Mazowiecki and Oleksy in the front row.

In 1988, Klepsch had been the pathfinder for the EPP, but not any more. Fortunately so, since one reason the left wing was in power again was that Centre Agreement (PC), which many EPP people had support69

ed in the years after 1990, had received less than 13% of the vote in elections to the Sejm. We had backed this party, which was led by the agile Jaros³aw Kaczyñski, not least because we had been advised to do so by friends in the Dziekania group. For more on this, please see the “Workshop Notices”.

Sadly, I must confess that I too was responsible for the failure of PC, because we in Brussels wanted to bring things together onto one stage too quickly. We were, of course, only motivated by the desire to be able to welcome many Polish EPP friends to the parliament in Strasbourg in the future. Gradually, all the warnings about the Kaczyñskis had become true, not to mention Mazowiecki’s warning about rigid National Conservatives in general, and therefore enemies of Europe. Together with us, many Polish groups and their advisors left the conservative camp, including friends like Janusz Lewandowski, who is now EU Commissioner for Poland. We wanted to make it clear that the EPP was not and had never been a stronghold of conservatism, and particularly not of nationalism.

Egon Klepsch did of course conduct further political research in Warsaw in 1994. He welcomed the work of the Polish Robert Schuman Foundation, which was founded by Mazowiecki, but which is not Christian Democratic. Piotr Nowina-Konopka received us as deputy of the European Committee in the Sejm, and informed us later about the situation in the Mazowiecki camp. Things with Bronis³aw Geremek were not straightforward. He remained opposed to the Freedom Union (UW) party joining the EPP or, later on, the EPP Group. And so it turned out that, in 2004, several good UW politicians left us to join the liberals. This was not helped by the fact that there were British Conservatives in the EPP Group at the time, which was therefore temporarily called “EPP ED Group”. The British and their Czech and Polish (PiS) friends finally left prior to the 2009 elections.

Of course, if you go exploring the political landscape, you will step on the occasional landmine. Klepsch hit one such mine in discussion with the UW Senator Zofia Kuratowska. The charming Pole pointed out she did not want to join the western Christian Democrats. Why not? “Because

Amongst critical friends at the Freedom Union: Egon Klepsch, Piotr Nowina-Konopka, and Zofia Kuratowska.

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they are against abortion, for example, on the orders of the Vatican.” We explained that this only applied to Irish Christian Democrats, was indeed becoming less relevant, and did not apply in the least to continental Christian Democrats. No, Zofia responded, she wanted to join a liberal camp, which she went on to do at a later stage.

Klepsch encountered some difficulties with Cardinal Primate Józef Glemp, who was happy to receive people in his palace on Miodowa Street in Warsaw, but who had practically no understanding of European matters. Not only did he mix up the EU and the European Council – that happens in the West, too – he seemed to believe that a few national governments made all the decisions in Brussels. He had absolutely no idea what the Parliament did. Klepsch could see why the Pope encouraged his Polish bishops to travel to Brussels and talk to people who worked as intermediaries between the church and the Commission or the Parliament. Glemp also raised the subject of the invasion of Poland by immoral Western countries, and learnt (for the first time?) that for example culture and schools would remain in the hands of individual states. Of course, one could never stop fools from highlighting opposing resolutions with no legal consequences, Klepsch said. There has been no shortage of moral outcry from the PiS over the years, which is unable to face up to reality.

Unfortunately, the sky was grey and it was drizzling over Victory Square in Warsaw when Egon Klepsch laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and read the plaques bearing the names of all the battlefields in Europe on which Poles have fought, from Narvik to Sicily, from Stalingrad to Arnhem, from Monte Cassino to Berlin.

Short stops: former Prime Minister Hanna Suchocka treated us to delicious food at Magda Gessler’s gourmet restaurant “Fukier”, and tried to explain the defeat of her government. Prime Minister Pawlak, whom we saw briefly, pursued the popular Polish theme of debt from his drawing room, and seemed to think we could help. Andrzej Kostarczyk was looking for new perspectives after the defeat of Centre Agreement; while Tadeusz Mazowiecki, speaking in his UW office, said the situation would “continue to change”. Very true.

This was one of the reasons we gave a sigh of relief when our entourage from Warsaw set off to visit Ze³azowa Wola, Chopin’s birthplace. On 25 May, the pianist Kazimierz Morski gave a private Chopin recital for Anita and Egon Klepsch and company, which included the German Ambassador Johannes Dohmes and Secretary Walter Doll. Many Western Europeans consider Chopin to be Poland’s only composer, unless of course they think he is French.

There is an amusing story involving Olesky and Chopin. In 1993, my wife and I had come across a vintner called Chopin in France, and bought six bottles of “red Chopin” to hand out as presents on our planned trip to Poland. To our amazement, we discovered that this was the first time the 71

winegrowing family had ever heard of a composer called Chopin, let alone a Polish one. Europe is gradually coming together. Olesky received a bottle and a story and decided to keep the wine unopened as a souvenir.

Not only did Klepsch, as president of the European Parliament, believe Poland would play an important role in Brussels and Strasbourg in the future; as a German, he also hoped that as many Polish friends as possible would join the EPP Group and play a part in achieving peace and prosperity. He was therefore as keen on successful entry negotiations as Helmut Kohl and Jacques Delors.

Egon Klepsch played a major role in developing EPP relations with Poland. He never gave up, despite many setbacks and disappointments, and could finally rejoice in the creation and progress of the Civic Platform (PO) party, which led to the successful government of Donald Tusk. Of course, he could not have suspected in 1994 that in 2010, his Polish friend Jerzy Buzek would be president of the European Parliament.

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When the Iron Curtain began to rust In 1971, my longstanding interest in the eastern half of Europe began to be transformed into concrete experience of post-war Poland. Out of this in turn emerged my involvement in the European People’s Party and in Christian Democratic foundations that supported the establishment of democracy in Poland.

In December 1970, German Chancellor Willy Brandt signed a treaty in Moscow that recognised the Oder-Neisse line as Germany’s de facto eastern border. He later did the same in Warsaw. According to Franz Josef Strauss, Bonn was “just legal millimetres” away from the border being recognised under international law. The German Constitutional Court therefore had to rule that the border could not yet be considered fully recognised.

In political practice, everything ran differently. Voters in the Federal Republic of Germany confirmed Willy Brandt’s policies, and the majority of leading journalists talked about the “settlement” (Süddeutsche Zeitung) of the Oder-Neisse problem. Never again did the SPD repeat the electoral success it achieved at the beginning of Brandt’s Ostpolitik.

The position of the “Evangelical Church in Germany” (EKD), which even before the Brandt government had called for the “Oder-Neisse line” to be recognised as the legal border, was now vindicated. The Catholic Church did not take the same line.

Despite the famous exchange of letters between German and Polish Catholic bishops in 1965, the German side was unable to give its blessing to Willy Brandt’s treaty. Its reasons were as follows: – adherence to the Vatican principle according to which international recognition of final post-war border regulations must be dependent on a peace agreement; – concern about Catholic refugees and displaced persons, most of whom were opposed to the SPD/FDP government’s policies. However, the Church was specifically not saying that the old borders should be kept; – the belief – shared by the CDU/CSU – that the recognition of the border would represent a special arrangement that did not take into account the problems of the division of Germany and the isolation of Berlin.

Like the CDU leadership, the Catholic Church had long been clear that the eastern border would remain and be dealt with at some point in the future. One of the bishops who held this view was Julius Döpfner, who, after the change in Polish leadership in 1956, challenged the episcopate to

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look for ways of reconciliation with the Polish people. His argument did not meet with much protest.

The development also had consequences for the Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK). This body, which comprised active laypersons, various Catholic associations, diocese delegates, academics and politicians from all the democratic parties, had to begin looking into the new East treaties, because they had been received positively by ZdK member “Pax Christi”, Ostpolitik proponents “Bensberg Group”, and parts of the German Catholic youth organisation BDKJ, but rejected by most representatives of exile groups and numerous Catholic members of parliament.

In spring, the Secretary General of the ZdK Heinrich Köppler rang me up and asked me whether I wanted to be part of the new “Eastern Europe Working Group”. He said they needed “a few people who weren’t committed yet”. In addition, I did not have any connections to the old German East, was the editor of a Christian weekly newspaper, and active in Ostpolitik.

I agreed, and soon attended my first meeting, where I was duly elected chairman by an almost unanimous vote no more than 15 minutes into the meeting. I had not expected this at all. Dr Herbert Czaja, a member of the German parliament, formerly of Kraków, for a time chairman of the Federation of Expellees (opponent of the Poland treaty), and Reinhold Lehmann, Secretary General of Pax Christi (supporter of the Poland treaty), were elected deputy chairmen.

When asked by the Secretary General whether I accepted the election, I said I did, with the addendum, “I will use Article 38 of the Grundgesetz (German constitution) as a guideline”. In the constitution, it is stated that members of the German parliament are not tied to any directive, but are only obliged to follow their own conscience. This was important, because on the day of my election, the German parliament had not yet ratified the Treaty of Warsaw.

Our talks were intensive and nearly always tolerant. We were of course in contact with Rome, the bishops, and the parties. Below is a summary of what was finally decided and voted for by nearly all members of the ZdK, including all CDU delegates.

On 19 March 1971, the plenary assembly of the Central Committee of German Catholics gave its unanimous backing to a declaration on German/Polish relations. The declaration had been preceded by long consultations on the Ostpolitik of Willy Brandt’s government. Below is the political essence of the declaration: “As members of their nation and the global Church, the members of the Central Committee of German Catholics welcome the long years of efforts by delegates of the state, society and the Church to improve relations between the German nation and its eastern neighbours and 74

to bring about a set of circumstances that make final reconciliation possible…

An unconditional agreement renouncing the threat and use of violence between partners would make a considerable contribution to securing peace in Europe. In 1970, the government of the Federal Republic of Germany signed treaties in Moscow and Warsaw that warrant careful and objective scrutiny, both in an all-German and an international context, with regard to their consequences for peace at home and abroad…

Any attempt to invoke the Church’s authority either for or against the signed treaties should be rejected. It is a matter of conscience for every politically minded and politically active German Catholic to decide for themselves which concrete steps will help create a lasting understanding between Germany and Poland. We would like to confirm our willingness to make sacrifices for reconciliation with Poland…”

It is a troubling fact of German/Polish post-war history that contemporary history books contain plenty of documents from the Evangelical Church in Germany and appeals made by the left-wing Catholic “Bensberg Group”, but seldom the above ZdK resolution, which makes our position quite clear. There were members who fully supported Brandt alongside others who agreed with me that the eastern border should not be recognised until after the reunification of Germany, but then it should be recognised immediately. Of course, there were not many who shared this opinion, apart from my friends (including my successor as chairman Dr Alois Mertes), as only a few West Germans considered reunification possible in the foreseeable future.

In 1972, I resigned my post as chair of the ZdK working group in protest at the Ostpolitik of the Vatican, which was personified mainly in Cardinal Agostini Casaroli. My successor, albeit only briefly, was my friend Alois Mertes. He saw the work through, which had lost its original motive, namely Brandt’s Eastern treaties. The German Bundestag ratified the Poland treaty, although most CDU/CSU members of parliament, who were in opposition at the time, abstained. CDU-governed federal states voted the same way, their minister-presidents influenced by Helmut Kohl in particular.

I must admit that, before the height of Bonn’s Ostpolitik, I was only interested in Poland “from the side-lines”. I read a lot about Eastern and Central Eastern Europe, but it was mainly political matter. When I was head of the Karl Arnold Academy in Bonn between 1962 and 1966, I introduced seminars on Poland, and organised talks with Polish exiles.

My friends and I were quite unusual in the CDU/CSU in that we held the view that the reunification of Germany would be dependent on the liber-

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ation of all the oppressed nations from Estonia to Bulgaria, but in particular Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary. For this reason, we also considered the opinions of the Polish Christian opposition in our seminars.

When the ZdK working group came to an end, I began Katholikentag Catholic Congress in Mainz to make trips to Poland, togethin 1980: Tadeusz Mazowiecki, Stanis³aw er with a few friends from the Stomma and W³adys³aw Bartoszewski group. In 1973, I visited the met John Paul II. Catholic University of Lublin, Cardinal Primate Stefan Wyszyñski in Warsaw, colleagues from the Tygodnik Powszechny in Kraków, and the “Clubs of Catholic Intelligentsia” in Warsaw and Wroc³aw.

Around the same time, Dr Vincens Lissek (ZdK) and Reinhold Lehmann (Pax Christi) in particular began to intensify their contacts with Polish friends in various cities. Lissek came from Guttentag/Dobrodzieñ in what had been Upper Silesia, and was discreetly channelling material help to the Church in Poland. They got to know active members of the political opposition quite naturally, e.g. believers like Professor Stanis³aw Stomma, but also liberals like my friend Andrzej Szczypiorski, who unfortunately died in 2000.

I was writing about Poland in the Rheinischer Merkur, but also in other publications, for a time under the pseudonym “Tadeusz Jutro”. In Poland, where the population was still subject to state controls, I made sure until 1988 that I made contact with the Church, the ruling nomenklatura, and the entire opposition, and in such a way that everyone knew I was approaching all three. Time has shown that this was the only real way to go about destroying dictatorship and developing democracy. Apart from being refused a visa by a Polish hardliner in the Polish embassy in Cologne at the time, I did not suffer any setbacks. Disappointments, yes, but that is another story.

The EPP Group in the European Parliament looks for new friends In 1980, I began to carry out research on behalf of friends who were on the leadership of the EPP and its parliamentary group. Discussions were held with EPP chairman Egon A Klepsch, my friend since 1960, to analyse the political situation in Poland step by step. During this process, it emerged that the so-called “pre-political space” between the Church hierarchy and 76

the ruling system was particularly complicated and unclear. I will discuss this first, and return later to how we went about approaching Polish political parties.

Prior to the founding of Solidarity in 1980, we did not hold any talks in Poland that were aimed at forming parties. The most we did was hold discussions to assess the occasional “independent” groups and parties that sprang up in the Sejm in Poland. A few EPP parties, including in particular the German CDU and CSU and the Austrian ÖVP, were able to build on existing links between the Catholic world in their home countries and Polish Catholics.

All member parties of the “European People’s Party” (EPP), which was founded in 1976, proceeded with caution and without making any commitments. Christian trade unionists from the “Christian parties” in the Benelux states, Germany, Italy and Austria also became involved. Their Polish partners came from ZNAK circles, the clergy, and often the world of academia. But some Western “Christian parties” were in contact with Polish Catholics who rejected ZNAK and who took on political missions in the West, even against the advice of the church. I shall Primate Cardinal come back later to ZNAK Bishop Alojzy Orszu(which means sign or sym- lik, participant in the Stefan Wyszyñski 1989 “Round Table bol in English).

After 1973, my discus- Talks” sions and those of Christian Democrats from other countries were always focused, unsurprisingly, on the behaviour of the Soviet Union and the position of the West, i.e. NATO. It is worth pointing out that between 1973 and 1980, it was generally accepted that the Soviet empire would continue to exist for a very long time, in spite of many tremors. Some of the problems affecting Poland both before and after 1980 continue to exist today: y In Poland, NATO was seen as synonymous with the USA. There was no differentiation, even amongst those who opposed the regime. For this reason, it was difficult to explain that the integration of Europe was a political and not just economic process, in which France was not the only critic of the USA. Although many Polish experts were able to work and study in Western Europe at the time, they were nevertheless often mistrustful of the EEC and later the EC and the EU. y Both before the first direct elections to the European Parliament in 1979, and long after, the elite among the Polish opposition, including 77

Tadeusz Mazowiecki and Bronis³aw Geremek, believed that the Strasbourg Parliament could be ignored because it had nothing to say and would not be involved in shaping the future; what was important, they thought, was the Commission in Brussels in particular. Unfortunately, Jan Ku³akowski, the BrusselsAgainst EU Christian Demobased Polish Secretary General of the crats: Father Rydzyk, European Organisation of the InternaRadio Maryja tional Federation of Christian Trade Unions, did not correct such impressions, or was unable to do so. Later on, not only did Ku³akowski benefit from Poland’s success to find a way into the EU, he also became a well-known Freedom Union MEP. y I was not the only Western European Christian Democrat to find Polish Catholicism quite different and therefore difficult. In the 1960s, all Western Christian Democrat parties had distanced themselves from a number of Catholic teachings, particularly in the area of ethics. Moreover, the bi-confessional parties in Germany, Holland and Austria had ceased almost entirely to take Church dogma seriously. The “Christian” parties also opened themselves up to non-Christians. This development was hard to explain to new friends. In 1980, even the wellinformed Professor Stomma asked me in private, “The (German) CDU is a Catholic party that listens to the bishops, isn’t it? I’m sure you can tell me that.” I did not get the impression that my express denial and account of the facts convinced him for very long. Nor did my point that nowadays a “privileged dialogue between the Church and the Party” on both sides was more useful than the old “order” have much of an effect. y Talks about social issues were particularly long-drawn-out and prejudiced, and amazingly did not take into account the different circumstances of the discussion partners. We therefore learnt in Poland before 1980 what the West Germans had to learn in the former GDR after 1990: that the “socialist” (in reality communist) and above all collectivist order in Poland had left deep scars in the souls and minds of the people, even when they were honest Catholics and considered themselves free of any communist influence. My West European friends and I therefore had to admit that there were areas of that fatal “coexistence” between red and black that neutralised part of the papal code of social ethics, for example the support of well-paid work, the rejection of egalitarianism, and the support of commercial competition. These and other issues had to be corrected later by Leszek Balcerowicz and others, who often found themselves at loggerheads with pious people who praised democracy in public.

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We assessed the situation at conferences, sometimes in Brussels, sometimes in Berlin. Those making regular visits to Poland informed friends also wanting to become involved “behind the rusting Iron Curtain” of the problems they could expect to find there.

At the same time, we tried to put ourselves in the position of the Polish people, who wanted to know more about us than they had before. The following document discusses these problems.

What psychological and related problems did Western Europeans have before and after the fall of communism in Poland, when they asked questions and held discussions?

The Catholic Church was seen in the West 1) as the omnipotent leader of the people; 2) as completely anti-communist; 3) as theologically and pastorally behind the times.

X We had to recognise and learn that the Church 1) having already lost influence over many intellectuals, quickly lost influence after the introduction of democracy (cf. Spain); 2) that the Church was to a large extent in tactical agreement with those in power that revolutionary developments should be avoided; that there were a surprising number of liberal tendencies, including outside the KIKs, often supported by Dominicans and Jesuits.

Polish agriculture was considered antiquated, inflexible and too fragmented.

X We had to recognise and learn that 1) the largely independent farmers had rescued the country, both after 1945 and frequently later; 2) the efficient part of the agricultural sector could be adapted to fit in with the EU with very few problems after the fall of communism; 3) Rural Solidarity, a trade union of Polish farmers established as part of the Solidarity movement, made a considerable contribution to the readiness of the agricultural sector to accept reform.

The nearly 200 mostly mini-parties that emerged around the time of the fall of communism caused the West to think that we would have to wait decades for a functioning system – particularly as we were witnessing daunting examples in parallel in other ex-communist states.

X We had to recognise and learn that 1) Poland had incorporated 5% and 8% hurdles into electoral law at an early stage; 2) the personnel was effective, capable of leading, transparent, and able to deal with carpetbaggers; 3) a large number of the small parties both tolerated and enabled mergers.

Poland had a centralist system similar to that of France; the government was for example suspicious of the border voivodeships. Our system of “regional politics” was unknown.

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X We had to recognise and learn that 1) centralism was at odds with regional economic interests (which E. Gierek admitted even in communist times); 2) the western voivodeships could see two very successful advocates of their development and expansion in the cities of Wroc³aw and Poznañ. And that the younger generation was now as appreciative of good regional politics as its Western neighbours. Of course, other standards apply at the border with Belarus.

Polish prejudices and convictions encountered by Western Christian Democrats False impressions of the integration of Europe influenced by the communists after 1948. a) It was seen as a purely economic exercise; b) the ever-increasing significance and competence of the European Parliament either remained unknown or was denied; c) after 1990, it was widely believed that Helmut Kohl had only to put his foot down and Poland would become a member of the EU “overnight”.

X We responded by 1) encouraging economic experts to speak on the political significance of the EU and to draw comparisons between the USA and the EU; 2) ensuring that more non-German delegates travelled to Poland to explain the power of the smaller EU states (e.g. the need for EU unanimity in financial matters). Minority representatives also travelled to Poland to talk about their rights.

Political party formation The Robert Schuman Foundation pubin Poland in 1989 lished three different leaflets in Polish to help improve understanding of the European Parliament.

Generally false impressions of smaller EU countries in particular, e.g.

Luxembourg and Austria.

X The Robert Schuman Foundation therefore brought in experts from the smaller EU states to speak at its seminars in Poland. Jenö Dzsingisz Gabor, originally from Hungary but a naturalised Dutch citizen, was particularly successful: in his new country he went from being Mayor of Haaksbergen to becoming Dutch Minister of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality in The Hague.

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As Poland moved noticeably towards increased opposition, and the nomenklatura spoke ever more publicly of being in a tight spot with no obvious way out, talks about the role of the Church were more difficult than expected. In 1973, the Primate told me in an interview that it was true that he had not yet allowed certain decisions by the Second Vatican Council, which would lead to democracy in the Church, to be printed: “We can have democracy in the Church when the communists have lost power.” I responded calmly: “Even if we defeat them, or they defeat themselves, it will be impossible to introduce democracy spontaneously.” The Primate said that that might be the case, but that nobody could know for sure.

I will just mention something that was less important at the time: during the demonstrations in Radom and Ursus in the 1970s, could anyone in Poland have imagined that the old nation state would shrink in a united Europe, and that joint European bodies would grow? The answer is an almost unqualified “No”. This issue still applies, as recent EU crises have shown.

This last problem area reminds me of the varied experiences of the EPP parties with regard to threats to democracy. Spain, Portugal and Greece all suffered under dictatorships after 1945. Other democracies were threatened by German conquest. At the end of the Second World War, however, people drew very different conclusions. In early May 1950, Robert Schuman changed Jean Monnet’s ECSC text, and added the commitment to the first stage of a European federation. It was clear to him that the new Europe would not just be the sum of sovereign states, but a considerable pooling of power. These problems were unknown from Estonia to Bulgaria around the time of the fall of communism, and it was not until the summer of 2010 that EU politicians began to sense that a single currency like the euro could not survive without the application of radically consistent EU law. If the “political union” fails, then the EU will collapse.

In 1989, when democracy triumphed in Poland, there were already numerous parties in the country, quite often tiny, calling themselves Christian Democratic, or claiming in their programmes to be a “Christian party” like the German CDU, the Italian DC or the Dutch CDA. In the first few years after 1989, over 190 parties applied to Warsaw for a licence, including many that claimed to be Christian.

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A few “Christian” parties that sought to establish contact with Western Christian Democrats Chrzeœcijañsko-Demokratyczne Stronnictwo Pracy (ChDSP) Labour Party The ChDSP had Christian Democratic predecessors founded in 1905, 1919, 1937 and 1947. They all had a Christian Social focus, but were specifically called the Labour Party rather than the Workers’ Party, although they did not have the same orientation as the British Labour Party. The last party, led by its chairman Karol Popiel, fled to England to escape the communists. On 3 September 1990, a group of returnees and people who had stayed in Poland re-established the party, which was now led by W³adys³aw Si³a-Nowicki, with returnee Stanis³aw Gebhardt as Secretary General. The party set itself up in opposition to the EPP by claiming to be the sole representative of Christian Democracy in Poland.

Chrzeœcijañsko – Demokratyczne Stronnictwo (“Zjednoczenie”) Labour Party (Unity) A parallel attempt to restart the pre-war “Labour Party”. The party name shows the split from the ChDSP. This party had the exiled secretary general Konrad Sieniewicz as honorary president (his friend Gebhardt remained in the ChDSP). Party chairman was Janusz Zablocki, who had crushed Poland’s most famous Catholic opposition group, ZNAK. Ryszard Bender, a professor at CUL in Lublin and today a right-wing member of PiS, sat on the executive.

Zjednoczenie Chrzeœcijañsko – Narodowe (ZChN) Christian National Union The ZChN was launched straight away as a Catholic, national conservative and Eurosceptic party. Although led by the moderate Wies³aw Chrzanowski, the party executive included fundamentalists like Marek Jurek, Antoni Macierewicz, Jan £opuszanski and Marian Pi³ka, whom we soon came to know in the West as opponents of our policy on Europe. Marek Jurek, who was born in 1960, was an early traveller to the West, and harshly rejected “Christian” parties.

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Koalicja Republikañska Republican Coalition This party came to our attention at an early stage, and seemed to be considering Western examples or models when it was founded on 29 June 1991. A few members were interested in a conservative party along British lines, while others wanted “something like the German CDU or the French UDF”. We established some personal contacts. A few members finally ended up in the PO.

Chrzescijañska Partia Pracy (ChPP) Christian Labour Party Founded on 21 March 1990, its chairman was Józef Hermanowicz, but it was in reality led by Party Secretary Maciej M. £êtowski, one of the Church critics of Wa³êsa’s group. £êtowski put forward conservative arguments but failed to find much support in the provinces.

Chrzescijanski Ruch Obywatelski (CHRO) Christian Citizens’ Movement Founded on 30 September 1990, its leaders included the right-wing cleric Antoni Maciarewicz and the more moderate Stefan Niesiolowski. Eurosceptic, few members.

The PChD was an early “Christian” party with regional focuses. Krzysztof Paw³owski discusses the party in an interview on page 95.

We subsequently came up with the slogan “Check, Help and Wait” in Strasbourg because we wanted to avoid hasty decisions, in view of our long involvement with the Polish opposition since the unrest of the 1970s, the foundation of the “Workers’ Defence Committee”, and the creation of wings in most Catholic and Liberal intellectual circles. Irrespective of this approach, it was also clear to the EPP that, although a process of differentiation had begun among the opposition popular movement, this did not guarantee either the establishment of strong democratic parties or coalitions amongst them. AMICI POLONIAE was banking on a Polish relief campaign, in which EPP politicians were particularly involved. Below is a resume of the life of the chairman of AMICI POLONIAE, Robert Battersby.

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PIONEERS II Robert Battersby and the AMICI POLONIAE When in 1982, or one year after martial law was declared, the social and economic situation of the Polish population began to deteriorate rapidly, Robert Battersby, a British Conservative MEP, suggested to the parliament that they found a relief organisation comprising members of all parties. The plan was piloted, eventually leading to the creation of “Amici Poloniae” (“AP” or Friends of Poland). Four party heads signed up:

„Bob” Battersby

Dr Egon A. Klepsch (European People’s Party – Christian Democrats), Sir Christopher Prout (European Democrats – Conservatives) Simone Veil (Liberals) Christian de la Malène (Neo-Gaullists) Who was “Bob”? He was born in 1924 and died in 2002. One might describe his life as extremely interesting, daring, dangerous and often surprising. He had a touch of genius about him: he spoke 12 languages, survived hard fighting during his time as a soldier, and became a convinced European, “because of the lessons which Britain also learnt”. Battersby was a businessman, but also an officer, after he joined the Royal Artillery in 1942. For a time he was one of the leaders of the feared 2/7th Ghurkhas in Asia. In 1944, the sportsman was employed as a bodyguard to Winston Churchill. Between 1946 and 1947, he worked as a secret service agent in Poland and the Balkans. It was during this time that Battersby gained the convictions that led to the foundation of the “Amici Poloniae” after 1980. Amongst other duties, Battersby sat on the budgetary committee in the European Parliament, and this was useful to the AP. He also became involved in European regional politics in Brussels after the UK joined the EC. In 1989, “Big Bob” lost his seat in Strasbourg.

However, he was not ready to retire, so he learned some more languages, travelled around Asia and joined a consultancy agency. He was in Bucharest when the Ceauºescu regime fell. Although a non-Catholic, he was awarded the Order of Saint Gregory the Great by the Pope for his work in Poland.

At that time Battersby quickly recruited around 50 delegates for his Poland campaign. Around 35 came from Conservative and Christian Democrat parties, a dozen from the Liberals, and two from Social Democratic parties. Of the 50 members of the AP, just three came from the Left, and they soon left. This was because, in accordance with Polish structures, the 84

practical aid went mainly to support the Catholic Church and its believers, and the majority of left-wingers could not agree with this.

The work of Amici Poloniae ended in 1993 as talks over Polish EU membership advanced. The balance sheet total: 170 million ECUs were spent on active work on behalf of Poland, generally through the influence of delegates on European Community budgetary items. The work was led by chairman “Bob” Battersby and his deputies Siegbert Alber (CDU/D) and Jas Gawronski (LIB/I). Gawronski’s family was from Poland. The group made sure its work was checked by other delegates.

The AP’s secretariat was run by the Pole Dr Marian Aposto³ and the Briton Stephen Biller, whose contacts in the Catholic hierarchy even included the Pope. In its early years, the AP would hold monthly meetings of its 10-strong executive, which would discuss verified and unverified applications from Poland, make the case for financial help from the Commission, and listen to reports from delegates or friends who had visited Poland.

A glance at the minutes of a few AP meetings shows that the small group of delegates inevitably also encountered larger political problems, because the AP could act with more discretion than some other administrative bodies. In 1985, for example, the Polish “Caritas bishop” Czes³aw Domin visited Brussels for the first time, there were confidential talks with Cardinal Franciszek Macharski of Kraków, and proposals for a visit to Brussels by Prime Cardinal Glemp. The talks in the EC Council of Ministers about help from Brussels for Polish agriculture were the subject of critical discussion. Because London was being very difficult about this aid, it was decided to send Battersby to the Foreign Office to present the AP’s concerns.

The leadership of the AP also approved measures with ambassadors from EC states based in Warsaw, provided these agreed in principle with AP intentions, e.g. Italy. In addition to financial aid, other ideas were supported, e.g. conferences for Polish doctors. Talks with the Polish episcopate about its planned “agricultural aid” were difficult because the bishops were still far from a proper political understanding of the EC. The Church’s well-intentioned project failed in the end.

On the other hand, the AP was a source of impetus in Poland. On 22 March 1985, for example, a group of world-famous public figures including Tadeusz Mazowiecki, Agnieszka Holland and Kazimierz Brandys wrote to ask for more medical help.

The activities of the AP ranged from providing a response to individual emergencies, for example transporting children suffering from cancer to the West for treatment, to large, high-cost projects like the school of arts and crafts in Auschwitz run by the Salesians of Don Bosco, which was incorporated into comprehensive documentation about the order from Bonn. Here and in other cases, “Brussels” contributed part of the costs, 85

although the AP also opened up other channels of finance. The east-west transfer channels using church and other banks far away from Brussels remained a secret.

Over the course of time, the attitude of the Polish authorities towards the AP improved, and they began to welcome aid even when it came as a result of the failure of these authorities. There was usually even harmony between the AP and Caritas Internationalis and Euro-Caritas in Brussels.

Over the course of time, and in particular once martial law was lifted, the focus of the AP’s discussions changed. Once, it channelled funds to help Chernobyl victims through Poland (1989); then it was about increasing funding for schools, no longer food aid.

On 12 June 1991, the AP finally held talks with Poland’s special envoy Jan Ku³akowski, whom many politicians with experience of Brussels knew because of his work with Polish exiles. He asked for support for the Polish plan to increase exports to the Soviet Union. Those present at the meeting also used the opportunity to establish contacts for EC aid destined for Prague and Budapest.

In short, work was already being carried out on the fringes of the accession negotiations. This marked the end of the work of Amici Poloniae. From now on, progress would be made in the open.

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Through a door called “Dziekania” From 1987 onwards, I was in close contact with the Warsaw-based “Dziekania” group, which was founded in 1985 by Professor Stanis³aw Stomma and led by Bishop Jerzy D¹browski. This came about because I knew Stomma well: he had visited Bonn back in 1958 and we had stayed in touch.

This group, named after a small street beside Warsaw Cathedral, was made up of people who were interested “in principle” in developing political parties, but who were also looking for other responsibilities. One of these activists was Janusz Reiter, who later became an ambassador in Bonn. One thing the members of Dziekania agreed on was that the pre-war Christian Democrats, including amongst others the Labour Party, would have few – if any – opportunities, and what was more should not be given any. Two of its officials had returned from exile in Rome, where they had enjoyed the support of both the Democrazia Cristiana and a few US “offices”, and cooperated with a union of exiled Eastern European Christian Democrats.

At Dziekania, general opinion was in favour of a “broad central party”, with a Christian Democratic character or at least influence, in the event of full democratisation. I listened and limited myself to a description of our position on European integration policy. Egon Klepsch did the same when he visited in 1988, as can be seen from the report on his trip to Poland. In short, in 1988 the friends were looking to attract more like-minded people, and they wanted to go “to Europe”, although they did not go into any detail, which we could well understand.

The post-communists had already succeeded at the time in bringing together around 130 small left-wing groups and communist associations in the SLD. Dziekania’s weakness was that it did not become a properly functioning think-tank because of time pressure. The “members” remained for the most part individualists; there was no real political leader. As the spiritual leader, however, Stomma was key in discouraging extremism among the opposition and instead encouraging people to try to find a balance, in order to help Poland.

Dziekania came to the conclusion that Mazowiecki’s Democratic Union (UD), which was made up of three “movements” within Solidarity, was unlikely to join a “Christian” coalition party. The reasons for this were threefold: firstly, Bronis³aw Geremek had a strong influence, and he was thinking of a liberal centre party and mistrusted nearly all Western European Christian Democrats; secondly, the left wing of the UD, which was led by the young W³adys³aw Frasyniuk of Wroc³aw, had Liberal Social and Social Democratic ideas; and thirdly, the influence of those UD leaders who could be described as Catholic and Christian Democratic did not extend much further than the circle of Catholic elites and their small magazines, even in the largest universities.

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However, this elite Catholic sector had not emancipated itself from the episcopate anywhere near as much as its best people, including Mazowiecki, had hoped. There was therefore no sympathy in the official church for the UD, and people like Geremek and Michnik were even the butt of spiteful remarks because of their Jewish roots. I met a bishop who admitted to me that he instructed letters from the UD and the newspaper Gazeta Wyborza to be sent to his sister, from whom he would collect them, otherwise he would have been denounced by the conservatives.

Those active in the Dziekania group nevertheless believed, despite such facts, there was a possibility of building bridges with the liberals around Gdañsk and other large cities. Since 1980, there had been a close cooperation between Christian Social, Conservative and Liberal supporters with a Solidarity background in the north of the country in particular.

“Pro Europe circles” had even begun to spring up there in 1989, mainly among students.

Discussion moved on to the question of who should be the overall leader of the groups to integrate them. In the end the group plumped for the lawyer Jaros³aw Kaczyñski (JK), who had a lot of friends in Warsaw, including bishops, but also maintained his contacts in Gdañsk via Wa³êsa.

He and his twin brother Lech were at the time not yet considered compromised. Talks with JK began in winter 1989.

The church took a neutral stance. In January 1990, at the end of exploratory talks, Bishop D¹browski said to me: “I wanted to motivate people, now they must work on their own.” As it happened, he was never able to become any more involved, as he died in a road accident.

The EPP and its emissaries, led by the Dutchman Wim van Velzen, were not against Mazowiecki or any “Christian” parties from the beginning – quite the opposite. However, we were aware of events that meant we had to make decisions whether we liked it or not. Our friends in the “Freedom Union” did not understand our motives at the time, but we were convinced that Poland would soon join the EU, and that Polish politicians would be elected to the European Parliament. As a consequence, the EPP had to decide which Polish parties it would align itself with.

Everyone in this worthy group must have been able to see that I was not the only one hoping that our friends such as Mazowiecki, Bartoszewski and Geremek would form a party that would cooperate with the European Christian Democrats. Every German CDU member with an interest in Poland believed without exception that Catholic Solidarity leaders and advisors would form a party or party federation that could become a partner of EPP “automatically”, as it were. However, Mazowiecki in particular saw things differently, as is evident from the following interview:

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Tadeusz Mazowiecki: Taking stock after 20 years On the 20th anniversary of the semifree elections (4 June 1989), Jacek ¯akowski, a journalist for the leftwing liberal Warsaw-based weekly magazine POLITYKA, interviewed Tadeusz Mazowiecki, who became the first democratic head of government in Warsaw in 1988. I have chosen only those passages from the interview that relate to the relationship of the political group Tadeusz Mazowiecki around Mazowiecki to European integration and to groups and parties in Poland at the time. As a result, the printed interview may appear to “jump around”. Nevertheless, it is useful in illuminating Polish party history after 1988/89.

J¯ What did you dream of back then (in August 1989), when you became Poland’s first democratic prime minister?

TM If changes had not taken place in other countries too, the most we could have dreamt of would have been to have the same status as Finland. Then, when Helmut Kohl managed to get the Soviet troops to withdraw from the GDR, I feared we might end up more like Austria, as a kind of buffer zone between the East and the West. As late as 1991, President George Bush senior was still trying to persuade the Ukraine not to break free from the Soviet Union. In other words, not even the Americans expected the collapse of the USSR. J¯ Would you say it was true that, at the time of the Solidarity leadership battles, you weren’t heading in any particular direction?

TM Not exactly. Aleksander Hall recently recalled the Solidarity rally at Centennial Hall in Wroc³aw, before the local elections in spring 1990, at which I proposed elections to a constituent assembly, followed by the adoption of a constitution within a year, prior to any general elections.

But the Obywatelski Klub Parlamentarny (OKP), the parliamentary representation of Solidarity in the Sejm and the Senate, called for early presidential elections. Zbigniew Bujak lost no time in putting himself forward as a presidential candidate. I would have preferred it if things had gone more slowly and therefore had more time to become established. But 89

Solidarity, Wa³êsa and his entourage were all pushing in the other direction. The idea of “speeding everything up” won.

J¯ And you finally decided to put yourself forward as a presidential candidate?

TM It was unavoidable, unfortunately. Although I considered Wa³êsa a great popular leader, the role of president requires other qualities. In one way, we were both poor candidates. I wasn’t convinced about my candidature, because I was aware it was causing division. This had an effect on my election campaign. At least Wa³êsa believed in his candidature.

J¯ One might almost think the alternative to fratricidal warfare (among the Solidarity leadership) was a sort of joint defeat.

TM It was a realistic alternative, although not until later. Both sides of Solidarity underestimated the reality of such a scenario, because, four years after the handover of power, the communists were returned to power in democratic elections. I remember that many people on our side, particularly in the OKP, thought it would be politically possible to retain our movement as a whole.

J¯ There were others who thought so at the time, not least Adam Michnik.

TM Bronek Geremek also shared that opinion. Even I thought it was possible for a while. We really didn’t look into creating a (new) democratic basis in the form of political parties. We didn’t take the least step in that direction in the government. We thought the Solidarity movement would remain our foundation. This didn’t change until I resigned, which I had to do in order to run for president.

Maybe this was not the correct way to proceed from the point of view of a purely political battle. But as far as I was concerned, my duty was not political battle but the rebuilding of Poland. I was quite hard-line about this. Many people seemed to think that my duty was to establish a Christian Democratic party in Poland, but I thought this would split our movement unnecessarily.

In any case, there turned out to be many obstacles that prevented us from subdividing into parties. For example, the left-wingers in the OKP thought they couldn’t be Social Democrats because the concept of socialism had been compromised in Poland. They wanted to be democrats but not Social Democrats. This shows the complete lack of planning that took place at the time with regard to this type of transformation.

J¯ Was it possible to plan at all?

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TM (Jerzy) Giedroyc of the Paris-based journal Kultura criticised us for not having worked a plan out in advance. However, before the fall of communism, we could only really practice the kind of moral politics that limited itself to calling into question the regime of the People’s Republic of Poland. Nobody could plan the construction of the new Poland on the rubble of the People’s Republic of Poland because nobody knew what the rubble would look like. And later, up until quite recently really, thinking tended to take place after the event.

J¯ Mazowiecki-style Christian Democracy was a good idea. When do you think you should establish it, or when did you want to establish it?

TM We should have had a plan. Helmut Kohl asked me about this too, because even in 1990, he had already begun to think about what the balance of power might look like in the EU and the European Parliament after Poland joined the EU. To me, this way of thinking was completely abstract. In any case, I didn’t consider the role of the parliament in the EU to be so important it was worth splitting up the parties in Poland.

J¯ Does that mean that Kohl was already seriously thinking about Poland joining the EU back in 1990?

TM He could see that things were going in that direction. We could see it too, in principle.

J¯ The Democratic Union (UD) and the Freedom Union (UW) were in the Christian Democratic European People’s Party to begin with, but they didn’t develop into a Polish Christian Democratic party.

TM That was because these parties had different wings, and the supporters of Christian Democracy were always in the minority within them. Together with Piotr Nowina-Konopka, I did manage to get us into the Christian Democratic EPP Group in the European Parliament, although this changed later on (when the UW delegates went over to the liberal group).

Interestingly, the Liberal Democratic Congress, now the Civic Platform (PO), which did not have any links with either the trade unions or the Christian Democrats, also belonged to the EPP Group (for a time).

J¯ It wasn’t just because you didn’t want to divide the political scene that you had difficulties with the Christian Democratic camp. You would also have had problems with the Church. After 1989, the church as an institution didn’t identify itself with Christian Democracy, but with (old-style) National Democracy. Nationalism and anti-communism became more important than Christianity and Catholicism.

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TM But only as time went on. At the beginning, the Church – like Solidarity – spread a protective screen over the democratic transformation process, so I didn’t have any difficulties. It wasn’t until 1 May 1990 that the problems began. I was in Stalowa Wola. Bishop Frankowski came back from a meeting of the episcopate and told me that the bishops had decided to reintroduce the teaching of religion in schools. That came as a surprise. As a Catholic, I doubted whether it was good for the Church for religion to be just another school subject like physics or chemistry. (Earlier) experiences of teaching religion in the parishes had after all been good.

J¯ But you went along with their decision.

TM Because I believed that, as prime minister, I had to comply with the demands of the episcopate.

J¯ Unfortunately, people in Poland continue to view the state as something strange and foreign.

TM This is also down to the weakness of those parties that, ever since the first parliamentary elections, continue to call into question everything that has been achieved so far.

J¯ The so-called Fourth Republic and PiS have turned fundamental criticism into a system. Do you know where what was the cause of this?

TM In my opinion, it came from the method of practising politics in which the interests of the party come before everything else. That is the mentality of people like Jaros³aw Kaczyñski. These people first infected Poland with their systematic criticism during the first presidential elections, when they called everything we’d done into question simply to ensure Wa³êsa’s victory, then later on they did the same thing during the first parliamentary elections, when they began to disparage Wa³êsa’s contribution too, because they wanted to take power themselves. They did the same thing to Donald Tusk in 2005. This fitted extraordinarily well with the Polish mentality, which has been shaped by two hundred years of not being in charge of our own country.

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“German question” not a stumbling block It was clear to all EPP politicians, and in particular the German ones, that during many discussions in and with Poland, the elephant in the room was the question of what the guests at the Vistula or the Oder thought about the border between Germany and Poland. Would the rest of an EPP delegation support the Germans, were they to point out that the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe had forbidden the recognition of the Oder border under international law? Did people “obey” the Germans de facto? Would the Germans even broach the thorny subject themselves?

This legendary “taboo” has scarcely played a role in the relationship between the EPP and its delegates on the one hand and their Polish friends on the other. None of our visitors have ignored the Oder/Neisse border. On the contrary, CDU MEP Dr Philipp von Bismarck, for example, chairman of Pommersche Landsmannschaft, a German association for displaced Pomeranians, donated his estate in Pomerania for use by young people, and invested a lot of money in it.

As we in Western Europe said at every opportunity, the border was here to stay and would no longer come into question. Nevertheless, it was not internationally recognised, and even Willy Brandt could not change this, because it was not accepted by either the German Constitution or the network of treaties safeguarding Berlin, amongst other things. This meant, however, that freely elected German and Polish parliaments could and of course should cast the final vote. This situation arose in 1989/90, and the border was of course recognised. A few delegates abstained.

We have never disputed the fact that there were politicians representing displaced persons who either rejected the border or initially thought it could be moved. The German EPP delegates were always able to elucidate the weight of the various claims made in Germany.

Very annoyingly, it was reported that Chancellor Helmut Kohl hesitated to accept the border after the fall of communism. This is a tenaPremier Mazowiecki i Helmut Kohl w 1989 r. cious lie that has even

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made it into the history books. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Kohl’s foreign policy advisor Prof. Horst Teltschik told Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki several times, and of course on behalf of Kohl, “that there was no question about recognising the border so far as Kohl was concerned”. I was there in Bonn in 1966, when both Kohl and Strauss stated in private that the border was not in question, but nor should it be “recognised prior to the liberation of Poland”. I would like to add – and hopefully some readers will be able to check this out – that the Polish foreign secret service reported three times before and after 1982 that Helmut Kohl backed the Oder border, but that he had to comply with “Karlsruhe”, and was not about to break international law in public. In 1988, when I was interviewing Mieczys³aw Rakowski for the Rheinischer Merkur at the embassy in Cologne, Rakowski confided in me: “I know that’s what Kohl thinks, but it’s not enough on its own, of course.”

EPP contacts with Poland received a boost when, after 1988/90, most partners simply did not mention the border question, and those that did expressed their satisfaction that the Germans who were arriving were in complete agreement with their European colleagues. We Germans know that we were deliberately misrepresented by a handful of Italians and a few French, but we also know that they had in fact been properly informed. If people are determined to sling mud there is not much one can do.

I am grateful to a few senior Poles living abroad and to Henry Kissinger in particular, who told the Polish side that Helmut Kohl could be relied on with regard to matters relating to the border, at a time when the Chancellor was waiting impatiently for the votes from the Bundestag, the Sejm and the GDR People’s Parliament after the departure of the communists.

Apart from Mazowiecki’s friends in Warsaw, who were always approachable, we also got to know others who described themselves more or less convincingly as Christian Democrats, and whom we recognised as such.

Of these, I would like to single out my friend Paw³owski, who visited me in Bonn at that time, and whom I met again in Warsaw in 2009 at the first big EPP conference. He is representative of a typical group: professionally successful, still interested in politics but not engaged in party-political work, a PO voter. Allow me to introduce him:

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Krzysztof Paw³owski: Illusion plus hope Twenty years ago, in 1989, Krzysztof Paw³owski was one of the first Christian Democrats from southern Poland to approach me in Bonn to find out whether my CDU friends and I would be interested in advising a fledgling Polish CDU. Paw³owski and some of his friends had followed the politics of the European Christian Democrats since their student days.

We began to exchange letters and texts, after which Krzysztof Paw³owski we helped set up the centrist Partia Chrzeœcijañskich Demokratów (PChD), and then commiserated when it failed to get off the ground. After a brief political career, Krzysztof Paw³owski returned to his work as an academic and businessman. He is a PO voter.

JW After the first phase of political development in Poland, you founded the PChD (Christian Democrat) party together with friends such as Katowice industrial expert Janusz Steinhoff – what were your reasons for doing this?

KP We wanted to do something after the 1989 elections. On 4 June on that year, the popular Solidarity movement won all the seats in the Sejm, which were freely-contested as a result of a compromise with the government, as well as all the seats in the Senate apart from one. It stood to reason that normal parties would emerge after that, indeed the seeds of such were already visible in the popular opposition movement.

JW As a party you had a name that already existed in Western Europe, and that still exists. What happened next?

KP Delegates and senators active in the first Citizen’s Parliamentary Caucus (OKP) and who had been sympathetic to Christian Democratic thought prior to 1988/89 organised a founding conference in Poznañ in 1990.

It was addressed by Professor Pawe³ £¹czkowski and many others, including Janusz Steinhoff.

JW So you were sympathetic, OK. How did things look before 1989?

KP I began working for Solidarity in Nowy S¹cz (southern Poland) in 1980, that is, straight after it was founded. Together with my brother, I also founded a “Club of Catholic Intelligentsia” (KIK) there, of which I was chairman between 1981 and 1987. Before the fall of communism, the regime had only authorised five of these clubs in Poland, as is well-known, 95

but later on it was possible to set one up anywhere. In 1981-1982, I was also a member of the synod of the Catholic Church. In 1989, I was elected to the Sejm, and we won 165 of 175 list votes cast in our voivodeship in local elections. Our “2nd candidate” alone received 94 votes. Later, I was nearly the only one of my close colleagues in the OKP group in the Sejm who attached great importance to industrial and economic progress.

JW So did your political career develop automatically from the beginning?

KP No, in 1990 I wasn’t planning either to found a political party or to be active in one, if and when new parties emerged. The PChD was finally formed following the merger of eight local political groupings. It modelled itself on the German CDU. We asked you and others in Germany for information, as I’m sure you’ll remember. When we created the party, I was voted chairman, completely out of the blue. Feelings were running high at the time of the vote and there was still no structure.

JW But then you all tried to organise the party’s work and influence?

KP Of course, straight away, because we knew there would be – amongst other things – more elections, and at different levels. The people who were already active drew up statutes. They recommended people for an executive and other party posts. £¹czkowski was supposed to be party chairman and I was supposed to be party secretary in the Sejm and have responsibility for the party’s political programme. During the conference, there was an unexpected discussion on the statutes and the candidates for the position of party chairman. I became chairman, as I said, and Pawe³ Laczkowski was elected secretary general at our first executive meeting.

JW How did you fare in the 1991 parliamentary elections, which were the first entirely free elections to be held in Poland since 1922?

KP We received 125,000 votes and won four seats (Anna Knysok, Wies³aw Klisiewicz, Pawe³ £¹czkowski, Janusz Steinhoff) in the Sejm and three in the Senate (Jaros³aw Barañczak, Tadeusz Kamiñski, Krzysztof Paw³owski).

Including the Senate, we received over 202,000 votes.

JW Were you disappointed to get so few votes in a Christian country?

KP Of course, but there were more than 180 registered parties at the time, many of whom unfortunately called themselves “Christian”.

JW And what happened after the elections?

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KP Not much as far as I was concerned, because I realised I wasn’t suitable as a party chairman. I didn’t have the necessary ability, for example, to mediate in so-called “misunderstandings” between party members. Also, I became ill, and so I concentrated on setting up a local business school.

It sounds funny today, but in the 1990s, I was the only Polish party chairman who didn’t set up a new party after resigning their position, splitting the old party into the bargain.

JW Were you able to leave politics altogether?

KP No, I went back to it again in 1993, this time as an independent candidate in the elections to the Sejm. I lost by just 0.9% of the vote; I needed another 2,432 votes of the 44,922 cast. Then I gave up.

JW Back to the KIKs. Did they fail in the elections?

KP Intellectually, not at all. Many of Tadeusz Mazowiecki’s Freedom Union (UW) politicians later emerged from their ranks and from affiliated circles. But there wasn’t the political apparatus in place, at least not for new parties.

JW What lay behind these unfortunate showings?

KP A lack of good information and communication. Until 1988/89, most of Poland was a political desert, in particular in the provinces with the exception of a few towns and cities. Martial law had beaten down the democratic spirit. There were no new or reliable methods of communication, and it was scarcely possible to distribute even simple news. This was why a lot of independent local and regional political initiatives grew up that knew nothing or very little about each other. They weren’t able to connect to each other.

JW Is that also the reason for your failure in the Sejm elections of 1991?

KP First of all, we had very few people who were suitable or, in particular, experienced, nor did we have enough money. On top of that, there was a lack of secure structures that we could use to reach voters.

JW The PChD’s rivals said at the time that either your party was too rightwing or it held too many Conservative Catholic ideas. What’s the truth of that?

KP I disagree. Unlike the Kaczyñski twins’ PC (Centre Agreement), the PChD was convincingly liberal. Among other things, we were against exaggerat97

ed centralism. In the end, however, both our PChD and the PC lacked united Christian charismatic candidates. There was a lack of suitably inspiring candidates at the next elections too. We had to accept that things would take time to develop and that democracy and party-political stability could only come about gradually.

The long road trodden

by Ró¿a Thun of Kraków I met her early on in beautiful Kraków. She is the daughter of Professor Jacek Wozniakowski, who is an art historian, a Catholic opposition member with friends in many countries, and who became the first democratic mayor of his city since the fall of communism. A polyglot, Ró¿a Thun has experienced both working with the Polish Robert Schuman Foundation, and fighting in the Ró¿a Thun streets with Warsaw’s first pro-Europe demonstrators. At first she kept her distance from parties – she hates intrigues – but she is also a realist, and so finally joined the PO after “much deliberation”. She is now a PO MEP and goes by the name of Ró¿a Gräfin von Thun und Hohenstein, as she is married to a member of the old Bavarian aristocracy. Nevertheless, this does not prevent her from being a liberal Christian Democrat. I interviewed her in 2009 on the fringes of the EPP conference in Warsaw.

JW The Polish Robert Schuman Foundation was founded by Tadeusz Mazowiecki and Piotr Nowina-Konopka after the fall of communism. We Western EPP parties were ready to believe at the time that your foundation was a kind of antecedent of a Christian Democratic party. However, that wasn’t to be. What were your goals and objectives at that time?

RT This foundation wanted to win Polish citizens over in favour of European integration. When we set up the foundation, there was no discussion of Europe in our country.

JW And why did you take the name of Robert Schuman?

RT That was Piotr Nowina-Konopka’s idea. He believed that by showing how Schuman brought about political reconciliation between the Germans and the French, this would send out signals to the Poles and the 98

Germans. Schuman was successful with his politics of reconciliation after the war. We wanted to publicise this, and of course the fact that he devoted his entire life to the unification of Europe.

JW Schuman was a Christian Democrat, not a cleric. Did people think this mattered?

RT It wasn’t considered important in Poland.

JW What about the Catholic Church in Poland, did it have an opinion on Europolitics?

RT Of course priests and bishops had an opinion on Europolitics, but the Polish Robert Schuman Foundation is completely independent, and wouldn’t be influenced by such opinions. We organised joint programmes with many institutions, including Catholic organisations. The church didn’t comment on the foundation’s goals.

JW Between the two world wars, there were politicians in Poland who were called Christian Democrats, and who referred to themselves as such.

They met up with western Christian Democrats on several occasions prior to 1939. What effect did that have?

RT On Poland today? That would be a matter for historians.

JW And in your opinion, what did the Poles think about Europe before 1945?

RT We never dreamt we would be able to be part of something like a European Community in our lifetime, although we never lost sight of the idea of Europe as such.

JW What do you hope to get out of your annual Europe marches, given that you as a foundation don’t formulate Realpolitik?

RT We believe it’s right to keep on promoting the idea of Europe publicly.

It’s important to keep stimulating our debate on Europe, and to sustain involvement in the best project of our joint European history. For example, we have been involved in producing a number of books, including school textbooks. The Polish Robert Schuman Foundation also hosts successful Europe seminars for teachers and people from other professions, students and schoolchildren. As a foundation, we have provided consultation to schools and educational institutes, not to mention the president of the Republic. I even remember how I introduced Primate Józef Glemp to 99

Robert Schuman with the help of Jürgen Wahl’s biography! He listened with great interest, and later often quoted Robert Schuman in sermons and pastoral letters. Many schools in Poland adopted the name “Robert Schuman”, and developed teaching programmes about Europe, as a result of our influence. And since there has never been enough money, we have always received a lot of voluntary support from pro-Europeans.

JW Do you manage to reach people even in distant parts of Poland?

RT Absolutely, there is now even a Robert Schuman House in Lublin in the east. We have achieved a lot. But what’s most important is that our foundation is now run by Poles from the younger generation.

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Mid-term review – under time pressure on the road to Kaczyñski’s “collective party” After I had several times provided Egon Klepsch with feedback on the situation in Poland, and heard how Tadeusz Mazowiecki had told both Helmut Kohl and the Austrians about his political distance from the EPP, EPP General Secretary Thomas Jansen was also able to form an impression “on location”. As he was a longstanding friend of mine, I was of course able to cooperate with him in this on the best possible terms. The formation of the new “Centre” party was now imminent.

The most important news as far as we were concerned was that a group of small “Christian” parties had become involved with friends from Dziekania. The group was planning a “central alliance”, and it was clear from the founding appeal that it was made up of Liberals, Christian Democrats from three camps, farmers, independent municipal councillors, and journalists. Of course, all of them were thinking first and foremost of their country, the next parliamentary elections, and fighting the communist nomenklatura, which was still active at the time. Only a few friends could see as far ahead as “Brussels”. Thomas Jansen and I, on the other hand, knew that the machinery of EC/EU rapprochement was in motion, and that we were not the only ones looking for partners in Central and Eastern Europe. And who would have believed us in Warsaw if we had said that we firmly expected Poland to join the EU, and to welcome Polish delegates into the EPP Group. So there was already some time pressure.

I got to know Jaros³aw Kaczyñski quite early on, in 1990, through Andrzej Kostarczyk, in a group of six people. We had agreed in advance that our discussions would be completely confidential.

My first impression was negative, but it was only based on appearances: JK got up in slow-motion out of a threadbare chair, and then sat back down again straight away after a limp handshake. He had food stains on his suit in several places and was badly shaven. His dark trousers were much too long for him, and as a result had collected a lot of dirt from the streets: there had been slush outside for days. Later, I became familiar with the rising star’s famous shabby dark blue coat. This was also much too big Jaros³aw Kaczyñski’s speech as the founder of “Centre” for him, and again tended to drag through the dirt. It did not seem to bother him.

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JK began talking straight away – rhetorically, and with a particular anticommunist thrust. He demanded help to establish his party, including financial help, which was forbidden. He had christened the party “Porozumienie Centrum” (PC), or “Centre Agreement”. I have to admit I liked the name. Had exploratory talks led him to omit the word “Christian” like the Spanish, to attempt to gather people together, and to target a broad central ground? It looked like it. He specifically wanted a Christian Democratic party, as he said and wrote, but the official party name gave no indication of this. I accepted that. They were, after all, seeking “reconciliation”.

I was less amused by the fact that JK seemed unconcerned about the concrete problems of starting a party: “We have people for that.” He believed that “my people” had gained enough experience by their opposition work. General Secretary, member recruitment? A listener growled, “That can come later, first we need Wa³êsa as state president.” They really had just this one concrete goal.

I then travelled around the country holding talks and making contacts. I wanted to find out as quickly as possible which people and groups throughout Poland could be used to form “PC coalitions”, in particular at local government level. Nobody on the EPP side had done that yet. People were unaware of the party political situation in most of the voivodeships.

JK seemed to believe that all we had to do was push a button in Warsaw. Over time, I got to know more than thirty potential PC partners.

The plan was for them to join up at a party conference, which eventually took place in 1991. The optimism was tangible, although nobody or practically nobody was interested in agendas, strategies or even European contacts. Kaczyñski treated people from the West like tiresome old aunts.

JK dominated the party conference in March 1991, and not just as a speaker. The small man was fascinating, despite being barely visible above the lectern. He already had his entourage of bland young attendants, which was to become so well known later on. Polish TV, which still toed the line and was fairly unchanged in 1991, was urged to focus on the new “leader”, who spoke at length about new elections to the Sejm and the Senate. Nearly all the media said about the new party was that it was supposed to garner voters for JK. No-one seemed interested in the fact that an executive was being elected. There was some mention in the newspapers of the party’s foreign support.

There were six prominent representatives of EPP parties at the founding party conference, but no national party chief or general secretary, although there was a vice president of the European Parliament. Speaking at the dinner, I said, “We want to see electoral successes from the PC first.”

The list of delegates attending the conference fuelled illusions. There were heroes of resistance and emigration, including the old Christian Dem102

ocrat W³adys³aw Si³a-Nowicki, who received a standing ovation. There were also people there from the small “Christian” parties mentioned above, that we had invited to attend the gathering of the centre forces.

Of the liberals, Janusz Lewandowski of Gdañsk and a few of his friends were interested in cooperating. Today he is a PO politician and a member of the European Commission in Brussels, and today still describes JK as “one of the biggest liars in history since 1980”. Later on, the liberals were the first to turn away from the Kaczyñskis, primarily because of “Jaros³aw’s autocracy”.

The Dziekania group was represented at the party conference by Andrzej Kostarczyk and a few able friends. However, they did not have the blessing of Professor Stomma, who again told me that Poland was not suited to “that kind of CDU”. Kostarczyk and his friends largely withdrew from the centre party after the first Kaczyñcki phase, and took a break.

Nowadays they generally vote PO but are no longer politically active.

Spirits were high at the founding of the PC in 1991, but this was shortlived, because on the evening of the party conference internal party programme consultations began. This was a key experience in all things Kaczyñski for us EPP folk.

After a good debate, General Secretary Thomas Jansen and I were asked to write a chapter on Europe for the PC election manifesto. Of course we were happy to do so. The next day, I was informed by a reliable source that JK had read the passage and told a select few (not the executive!): “We will print what these Germans (sic!) have written. But we must make it clear that we don’t intend to do any of it if we get into power.

Poland must not be dependent on Brussels.” I asked JK directly whether I had been correctly informed. He lied, “You shouldn’t believe everything; of course I’m pro-Europe. The first thing we need to do is join NATO.” This was not the first time he realised that he had failed to understand something, and suppressed the findings vigorously.

Tadeusz Mazowiecki and those around him clearly did not expect the EPP member parties or the EPP Group to support cooperation with the Kaczyñskis. The EPP’s East Commission was after all led by the Dutchman Wim van Velzen, and Mazowiecki had counted on Dutch understanding for his planned course of action. Mazowiecki went so far as to complain to the Christian Democrats in the Netherlands about the EPP’s course of action. What he did not know was that Kostarczyk already had business relations with friends in the Netherlands outside of the world of politics.

In April 1991, he and I attended a private CDA meeting in Nordwykerhoud (NL) near The Hague, at which there was no discussion of the nature and direction of EPP contacts in Poland. The talk was much more about Dutch help for Polish farmers.

On 27 October 1991 – election day – after half an election year and a clumsy election campaign, I found myself at PC’s Warsaw headquarters.

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The party received just 8.71% rather than the expected 11%-12%. Mazowiecki’s UD – which is now called “Freedom Union” (UW) – came first with 12.31%, and the Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) came second with nearly 12%. Militant Catholics, opponents of European integration, gained 0.2% more of the vote than the JK camp. The “leader” did not turn up at PC HQ all night; he was only to be seen on TV. I am quite certain that he did not despair at the time, quite the opposite. He decided, time and again, to “collect” everything he could that had political potential, by any means possible. Things went wrong on several occasions. But JK was not bothered by bad luck, because he stuck to his principles: lead from behind the scenes. And over the years, he developed another gift: JK can hold lengthy discussions with any man or woman he wants to win over with his charm.

EPP’s first disappointment was called Kaczyñski At the end of 1991, we began to doubt the PC “collective” party for a variety of reasons. I told the EPP Group: y JK did not permit democracy within the party. He also assumed sole rights for appointing officials. He treated the Christian Democratic idea, developed from Don Sturzo’s time to the present day (EPP), as a “throwaway tool” or a “table flag for visitors” (according to a former PC committee member). Moreover, he made it increasingly clear that he planned to rule Poland in an even more centralist fashion than the communists, and would replace anyone who disagreed with him. y The second reason had to do with PC member Jan Olszewski, who was prime minister of Poland between 1991 and 1992. JK helped the conservative human rights activist, who had been active since 1972, to form a government, and demanded the role of senior “quiet advisor” in return. Olszewski refused. More than 40% of PC members left the party, followed by a further 30% soon after. In 1993, the PC was voted out of the Sejm. JK was the only one on the Solidarity Electoral Action register to survive, which he managed to do by bowing to Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek. Brother LK was appointed Justice Minister by “dear Jerzy Buzek”. y The genuine popularity of the successful Justice Minister soon encouraged brother JK to set up the PiS (2001/2). In JK’s autobiography, he wrongly claims that the PC continued to exist after 1993 until 1998.

In reality there was nothing left of it, and the membership list was transferred, with the help of lawyers, to Solidarity Electoral Action.

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y One of JK’s popular lies is that the PC “elite” faithfully followed him into today’s PiS. I have compared the organisation lists and spoken with Lewandowski in Brussels, amongst others. In 2006, PiS’ Komitet Polityczny (some dozen men) included just (Interior Minister) Ludwik Dorn, (PiS party chairman) Przemys³aw Gosiewski, and (Culture Minister) Kazimierz Ujazdowski from the old PC executive. Newcomers included (former PC co-founder in Upper Silesia) Adam Lipinski, (former head of the secret service) Zbigniew Wassermann, Silesian PiS boss Jerzy Polarczek, and Mariusz Kamiñski, joint controller of the Polish “Gauck Authority” and head of the Central Anticorruption Bureau in Poland until November 2009. Other key players in the leadership of PiS defected to JK from the national clerical Christian National Union (CChN) during the “Kaczyñski break” (1992-2001), in particular (Sejm Marshal) Marek Jurek and Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz, prime minister between 2005 and 2006. y The “small circle” around JK comprises even fewer people than those on the above-mentioned official executive, namely just Dorn, Jurek, Marcinkiewicz, Wassermann and Kamiñski. It also features LK colleagues and all kinds of informants, yet in 2006 he did not have a single woman on board! y The PiS “council” or large executive has more than 160 members, but in 2006, my friends and I could only identify 13 of them as former members of the PC council. Much more interesting are some of the arrivals from other camps. Iwo Bender, for example, is the son of former Lublin professor Ryszard Bender, a radical supporter of clerical fascism (Franco, Salazar). Artur Górski is one of three ultra-right monarchists. Arkadiusz Czartoryski, a member of the former high nobility, had already come to my attention at Warsaw University in 1989 as a militant despiser of Western democracy: “They are all sick in the head.” y Adam Bielan MdEP (PiS spokesman until May 2010) is one of the masterminds of solidarity between the Polish right wing and Pinochet, and is also a fan of General Franco. Together with Marek Jurek, Bielan visited the fugitive Pinochet in a London hospital. They gave him a picture of the Virgin Mary from the former Polish Vilnius and said hopefully, “Maybe one day we will be able to live in a Polish Vilnius again.” Marek Pilka became known to Polish EPP delegations because of his blatant rejection of an integrated Europe and his fondness for Mrs Thatcher. In the late 1970s, it was discovered by the Italian counter-intelligence service that, after a visit to Western Europe as a student, Marek Jurek had written a report (for whom?) in which he de105

nounced European Christian Democrats as “largely homosexual”, Freemasons, “unbelievers”, and – so far as the Dutch were concerned – “partially opposed to the Church”.

Below is an analysis of JK’s political beliefs, supported by – amongst other things – texts by Polish journalist S³awomir Majman, with whom I have nearly always agreed since the fall of communism. He says, “In order to understand JK, one must be aware of the following: y his outstanding skill at lying logically and convincingly, and at completely ignoring opinions that he does not like; y his consistency over long periods of time, e.g. he still expresses the same opinion about European integration, practically word-for-word, as he did in 1988, when he first became involved in political discussions; y his complete lack of scruples in choosing ‘fixed-term allies’; y his open admiration of strong state systems, and of men of authority like de Gaulle and George W. Bush; y his occasional childish fondness for historical books, flags and other national symbols, military music and parades, and giant church services and mass pilgrimages to Czêstochowa.”

As early as 24 July 2002, JK had one of his speeches criticising the EU put on the Internet, in the three working languages of the EU. This was followed by two speeches with similar content but not available on the Internet. Analysis of these speeches demonstrates the following beliefs: y the “bloody 20th century” cannot “be ended simply by an EU Convention”; y Poland’s entry to the EU will only serve Polish financial interests, but the Polish delegation in the Convention is quite unreliable in national terms; y “the introduction of the euro marks the final completion” of European integration; y Giscard is useless as president of the Convention, because he is “old and has been politically inactive for more than 20 years” (!); y the Convention has never received democratic authorisation; y EU Europe is ruled by a “constructivist elite” that needs to be “driven out” decisively; y only nation states can act with Europe in mind, not the European Parliament; y two members of the Polish delegation in the Convention are in favour of electing a prime minister of Europe, which is “intolerable” even as a theory; y European legislation is “diseased” and should be scrapped wherever possible; y those in Brussels behave in an unacceptably anti-American way; y Ukraine and Turkey should be admitted.

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There is nothing I can add to this. I do not understand why, when ratification of the Treaty of Lisbon was officially completed in 2009, numerous journalists were wondering whether JK’s twin Lech Kaczyñski would sign it or not, when they knew his brother’s theories, which he so often shared.

Meeting with Jaros³aw Kaczyñski in spring 2004 in Warsaw, recorded by Christian Kremer, EPP Deputy Secretary General Because of an increase in rumours that MEPs from the Truth and Justice party (PiS) would not join the EPP Group when Poland joined the European Union (1 January 2004), EPP chairman Wilfried Martens decided at short notice to request a meeting with PiS chairman Jaros³aw Kaczyñski. PiS had applied to join the EPP some time earlier, but had never submitted the necessary documents, in particular the party manifesto, details of the inner-party structure and democratically agreed objectives, rules of procedure, and personal details. I also attended the discussion, which took place in the Polish Sejm, along with Klaus Welle, the then Secretary General of the EPP-ED Group in the European Parliament.

Jaros³aw Kaczyñski turned up to the meeting with a colleague, who also interpreted between English and Polish. The atmosphere was extremely cool from the very beginning. After we had exchanged a few pleasantries, Martens began the discussion by explaining the reasons for our visit. Kaczyñski listened to the arguments and responded quite clearly that he no longer wanted to pursue membership of the EPP on behalf of the PiS. He gave two main reasons for this: on the one hand, PiS could not imagine belonging to the same European party family as the German CDU, as the positions of Bundestag deputy and BdV chairperson Erika Steinbach in particular were diametrically opposed to his party’s positions.

The clarity with which he presented this argument showed a large degree of irreconcilability with the CDU as a whole. On the other hand, he argued, the EPP’s European policies were very far from those of his own party. He backed up this argument by quoting the then chairman of the EPP-ED Group, Prof. Dr Hans-Gert Piettering, who had been speaking on behalf of the Group in connection with the constitutional convention. As far as Kaczyñski was concerned, the EPP was too focused on a federal Europe, and this was not the position of PiS. After Kaczyñski had clearly presented his arguments, Martens politely offered to meet again for discussion, and then the discussion was over.

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Today, the PiS delegates and their allies are members of the right-wing faction in the European Parliament, founded by the British Conservatives, who reject any further integration and are even in favour of Poland leaving the EU. Even before 2009, PiS had no intention of sending its MEPs to join the EPP-ED Group. All JK said to them was this: “Ask around within the EPP Group, and cooperate with a possible departure of the British Conservatives, so that we can build a new party with them which the Czechs (ODS) can join too, among others.” JK’s advisor with regard to this plan was (besides Bielan) Marian Pi³ka, a former member of the committee on foreign affairs in the Sejm, who left the ZChN to join the PiS.

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Thinking back to the beginning After the breakdown of relations between the EPP and the Kaczyñski group, there followed years of cautious exploratory talks, dialogue with the AWS electoral alliance and the elected government of Christian Democrat Jerzy Buzek. In between times, the “post-communists” were victorious, and then the Kaczyñskis worked their way back up again by means of new and old alliances. At a conference in Cologne in November 1991, we recalled the ideas and considerations that had moved us at the end of 1989. Below is a series of excerpts from a report on one of the first “stocktaking conferences”:

“After the initial years when we researched and got to know the democratic powers in Eastern and Central Eastern Europe, we pursued a strategic plan agreed by the member parties of the European People’s Party (EPP) in the course of 1990/91. This plan was carried out principally by the EPP East Commission led by Wim van Velzen (C.D.A. – NL), which continued the work of the EUCD’s East Commission, which had been set up in 1981 and subsequently led by Prof. Angelo Bernassola (DC – I).

The plan has two operating levels: The European People’s Party, which in 1990 already united 14 parties representing 35 million votes in the EU region. After the fall of communism, the EPP merged with the European Union of Christian Democrats (EUCD), which also included European parties outside the EU, such as Austria’s ÖVP and the Swiss Christian Democrats (formerly Conservatives).

The EPP Group in the European Parliament. The group was and is and continues to be particularly effective in developing relations with the “new Europe” through its “Foundation for European Cooperation” (today: “Robert Schuman Foundation”), founded by the EPP Group presidency prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall.

It went without saying that some – not all – EPP member parties developed their own connections to Poland. They forged links with the EUCD and later the EPP in the process. Prior to the establishment of the Polish freedom movement Solidarity in summer 1980, there were around ten such parties spread across a range of countries.

In Poland, the EPP was faced with a difficult and unusual situation from the very beginning, because, after the war, the Stronnictwo Prace (SP), i.e. the Polish (Christian) Labour Party, was recognised by the statutes of the Christian Democrat International (CDI) as being entitled to be the sole global representative of Polish Christian Democrats. This was possible because when the communists got rid of the SP in 1950, the latter went into exile, and the CDI presumed that its Polish sister party continued to exist legally. Similar events determined the scene in Prague and

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Budapest at the time, and this also had consequences for migrating Christian Democratic exiled politicians.

At the time, relations between the Western Christian Democratic camp and their friends in Poland were marked by the battle for the implementation of freedom and democratic pluralism, not by a debate about ideological options under the protection of the Polish church. Consequently, matters like economic policy were rarely, if ever, discussed; at most, discussion would touch on the effects of a planned economy on families. West-east meetings were much more likely to discuss the victims of dictatorships and all kinds of relief efforts.

Western Christian Democrats wished for and maintained close contacts to the Polish Catholic Church, but these were generally kept as confidential as possible. Nobody wanted to burden such contacts with ideological squabbling. Of course some Western aides would give speeches, e.g. at the CUL in Lublin, in which they would emphasise that, according to Western European understanding, Christian Democratic parties no longer wanted to be Catholic Church parties, and were open to everyone who supported their political manifesto, i.e. also to Protestants and non-believers. Sometimes Polish friends agreed, but more often they reacted with amazement.

In general, European Christian Democrats refused the close, almost friendly relations that some Western Social Democrats had with Polish communists, when they described themselves as “flexible”. On the other hand, this meant that Christian Democrats developed relationships with more left-wing friends in Solidarity from 1980 onwards, all the more so after martial law was declared in Poland in December 1981, when Polish democrats needed active, public, non-partisan help “without transition”.

Relief aid ranging from food to paper, printing ink and small printing presses flowed to the Polish underground from more than ten Western European countries. Christian Democratic involvement in this was high, while the Western European left managed to avoid the issue and restricted itself mostly to protesting.

The lifting of martial law, long before the fall of communism in 1989, marked the beginning of the most difficult phase in EPP relations, with the visit of the EPP Group presidency to Mieczys³aw Rakowski’s government, and to the then only “semi-free” Lech Wa³êsa isolated in Gdañsk.

The Christian Democrats were the only Western party family to visit Poland before the “round table talks”!

In 1989, those EPP parties really interested in European Ostpolitik knew that the self-liberation of the countries in the other part of Europe would also lead to a differentiation in the political interests that were on the agendas, namely the foundation of democratic parties in these countries.

It soon became obvious that alliances between intellectuals, “ordinary” people and workers from the time of the anti-communist struggle were 110

breaking down at different speeds. The events reminded the older Western generation a little of France, where the expected victory over Hitler dispersed the French resistance politically after 1944. Was the same thing threatening on the Vistula? Were there any other solutions?

Nowadays, many people have forgotten this example of Western caution, namely that, in the 1970s, Europe’s Christian Democrats had bad experiences with countries in which democrats of all types were trying to make the transition from dictatorship to democracy. The difficulties experienced in Spain and Portugal in particular continued to be a source of concern. It took quite a long time for party systems to become established in both Iberian countries. People still remembered this in 1989, and some Western strategists did not want to accept that the right-wing dictatorships in Madrid and Lisbon were any different from the communist nomenklatura in Poland. Above all, NATO member Portugal and NATO friend Spain did not have a command economy similar to that present in the communist world.

Both in 1990 and later on, people drew the obvious conclusions from the Iberian experiences, and with good reason. The following questions had to be asked when considering relationships with Polish partners: Are the resistance groups that the EPP has supported since 1980 still sufficiently rooted in the people in 1991 to win enough votes in elections?

Are they likely to turn into real political parties?

Have potential EPP partners recognised that the success of Christian parties in the West since 1945 has been strongly dependent on general political, but even more on economic and politico-cultural competences, and far less on Christian churches, although it is true that the churches made a significant contribution to liberal-democratic progress after the war?

Would the Polish opposition understand the completely new type of European integration that had taken place over the past 40 years since 1950, and could it prioritise it correctly, i.e. political integration first and economic integration only second? Did it recognise that this integration requires the renunciation of large parts of national sovereignty?

And last of all came the most excruciating question: given the conditions of dictatorship, would the Poles be able to bring about a change in mindset as mentioned in such a way that enough people had at least an idea of what was to be done after the fall of communism? It is a known fact that Mazowiecki’s government was faced with problems resembling the Himalayas. Today, people are happy to overlook the fact that there were still a few communists in key positions at the beginning, made safe by (highly necessary!) compromises at the “round table talks”.

The European Christian Democrats had lost the political battle in Portugal early on because their first partner, the CDS, remained imprisoned in very old conservative ideas. The CDS was therefore excluded from the EPP for being too un-European. People like to overlook this today, even though it was a landmark lesson.

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After the fall of communism in Warsaw, the above-mentioned Polish Labour Party SP rather naively claimed exclusive rights to represent Christian Democracy. However, this claim was never accepted by the EPP. At the elections on 27 October 1991, this party, together with PAX heirs in “Christian Democratic” clothing and some splinter groups, suffered an expected and deserved defeat. It was not the first exiled party in European history that did not manage to relaunch itself.

Because of experiences like this, the EPP began to look for Eastern partners with forward-looking ideas as early as 1985, and then more intensively from 1986. Progress was slow at first, as martial law was still having an effect. The party gave lectures in Kraków, Wroc³aw, Gdansk, Lublin, Warsaw, Gliwice and Toruñ where it explained to listeners – mainly students – what a Christian Democratic party looked like in modern Europe, or what it could look like. Because the EPP wanted Poland to join the EC, as it confirmed at its party conference in Dublin in 1990, it also wanted a fraternal party in Poland that one day could be a member of the EPP Group with a strong group of parliamentarians. This meant a rejection of every Eurosceptic, nationalist or anti-pluralist group in Poland. In Dublin, a couple of young Polish guests heard how the EPP was completely against cooperation with clerical fundamentalists like those represented in the Christian National party ZChN, for example.

A political party “suited to the EPP” should therefore always stand in the historically plausible political centre and thus be organised as much like a “popular party” as possible. It should be open to citizens with conservative views, but also have enough room for liberals. Equally clearly, a party without a socially progressive wing (in the spirit of the Church’s code of social ethics) would not fit into the EPP. Another initial rule of the EPP and the EUCD was that a country could only be represented once in our “transnational” party. If there were several “Christian” parties at work in a country, they needed to form a joint “team” to represent them in Europe. One can imagine what effect this explanation had in Poland, but it also had to stand up to Belgians and Spaniards. Not to mention the Germans, with their two parties, the CDU and the CSU. The EPP has since abandoned this condition because it has to take specific developments in some Eastern Europe countries into account.

Finally, the EPP made it clear that it was only interested in Polish partners that looked to a “social market economy” and firmly rejected state interventionism, unless it took place in the context of exceptional emergencies like the financial crisis of 2009. The numerous private and official talks conducted with Prof. Leszek Balcerowicz at the time made it clear that he shared many of the same views as the EPP, and that was a lot in 1990.

All early EPP talks in Poland took the four points described above into account, including the bilateral talks, in which the Dutch CDA, the 112

Italian Democrazia Cristiana, the CDU and the French CDS were primarily involved. Of those parties represented in the EUDC, which had not yet merged with the EPP, the Austrian ÖVP provided the most help to Poland.

It was encouraging that the EPP was able to reach agreement with the (old) Conservative Party, which was a member of the European Democrats in the European Parliament, in talks held in Poland. This meant that the EPP and the Conservatives were acting in concert. Unfortunately, not for very long, since Margaret Thatcher became involved and denounced Christian Democracy, even in Poland, as – to use her old phrase – nothing but “socialism by the back door”.

PIONEERS III Andrzej Kostarczyk – A European in the spirit of Schuman I got to know him first as a journalist, then mainly as a convinced Christian Democrat with a group of reliable friends. Elmar Brok of the EPP Group joined our group. We admired Andrzej’s multilingualism, his extensive range of contacts in the Church and the opposition, but also his background knowledge of the ruling nomenklatura. It therefore made sense for Andrzej to become an authorised representative of the new group for talks in Western Europe during Jan Olszewski’s government (1991/92), which was largely supported by the PC.

The father of two sons is here being interviewed on the subject of the opposition Dziekania group, without which it would have been impossible for the EPP to build bridges to Poland. He has written books on Afghanistan, which he has visited several times in recent years.

JW Was Dziekania set up by Prof. Stanis³aw Stomma more or less singlehandedly, as some politicians claim?

AK He took the initiative, that’s true. He had a very good working relationship with (auxiliary bishop) Jerzy D¹browski (Deputy Secretary General of the Polish Bishops’ Conference). Towards the end of the martial law period, he wanted to find a special place for moderate Solidarity people who were not in favour of radical political development. I followed Stomma’s suggestion, and we found ourselves in a church on Dzieka113

nia Street in the centre of Warsaw’s old town. The plan was to exchange ideas and even share visions to overcome the paralysis in our country, which was crippled under martial law.

JW Was Janusz Reiter, later an ambassador in Bonn, typical of the group?

AK Yes, but so were Marcin Król, Karol Barczik, and Jan WoŸniakowski. Marcin Król for example came from Tygodnik Powszechny. We also had a few liberals.

There were lots of different political views represented in the group.

JW Did you also produce a publication?

AK Yes, Król produced a magazine, but it only came out once. He started again when martial law was lifted, but without much success. Do you still have a copy of our issue no. 1?

JW I do indeed. Now back to Dziekania and Bishop Dabrowski. Is there any truth in the publications that came out in Italy and other places that claimed he once cooperated with the SB secret service?

AK These rumours were never confirmed. In any case, even if such a contact did exist, it wouldn’t have affected our group, because the bishop actually only came to meetings once or twice. It was Stomma who sat at the head of the table the rest of the time.

JW I came to one of those meetings, as you know. People had very, very different views.

AK You’re completely right. There was for example Aleksander Hall’s group from M³oda Polska (Young Poland). Stomma had a particular sympathy for this group because it shared a few of Roman Dmowski’s views. Technically, Hall’s people were National Democrats, but not the pre-war anti-Semitic kind. Stomma wasn’t a dogmatist. He had a lot of left-wing friends.

JW Particularly in the Federal Republic of Germany.

AK Of course. Why? Polish intellectuals, both Catholics and others like Adam Michnik and Jacek Kuroñ, feared a return of the old pre-war antiSemitic national democracy if Poland managed to liberate itself from the Eastern Bloc. Stomma really hated Dmowski’s anti-Semitism, but he considered Hall to be an enlightened pro-European conservative. So as far as Stomma was concerned, if there was going to be a new type of politics that made reference to Dmowski, his preferred option would be Hall’s politics.

This was the view of the old man, born in Vilnius but not a nationalist.

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JW Was it not true that Hall’s group had a close relationship with Margaret Thatcher, who described Christian Democracy as socialism through the back door and worse?

AK Yes, for a time. There were people in the Conservative Polish “Windsor Group”, which was the only group to have direct access to Thatcher.

Today, it is more important that Hall was a great admirer of Charles de Gaulle. As a result, he was not particularly interested in western Christian Democrats, but his man in Gdañsk, Walendziak, had such tendencies of which the CDU took advantage, inviting Hall to Bonn. There was also a group in Dziekania who were “in principle” Christian Democrats, such as the lawyer Hniedziewicz; I counted myself among them. We were interested in real pluralism. We never really wanted to become an organisation. We were semi-legal under martial law. That passed by.

JW One day, Reiter told me that Dziekania didn’t exist any more. Why was that?

AK Because we always thought pluralistically, this had consequences after the fall of communism. After all, a huge range of different ideas was put forward at the Round Table Talks. Rebellious WOLA employees (Warsaw district) and radicals like Antoni Maciarewicz joined Dziekania for a while and criticised the outcome of the Round Table Talks. What was the point?

The Mazowiecki group thought that state power was still very strong, and was prepared to compromise with it. It expected a long period of change.

Others wanted to carry on fighting immediately. In the end, the state turned out to be weaker than people had believed. Mazowiecki had been wrong.

Nevertheless, it is foolish to rehash the debate about what might have happened, like the Kaczyñski people did and occasionally still do.

Wim van Velzen – Explored and coordinated from Estonia to Bulgaria As coordinator of Ostpolitik for the EPP and EPP Group, the Dutch European politician, born in Rotterdam in 1943, was for many years our political parliamentary trailblazer in Eastern Europe. The Catholic teacher began his political career in the Dutch parliament, where he was president of his party, the CDA, between 1987 and 1994, before becoming vice chairman of the EPP and the EPP Group. After the fall of com-

Wim van Velzen

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munism in 1988/89, van Velzen expanded his East Commission and increased his visits to Warsaw, Prague and Budapest, where he was made president of the Robert Schuman Institute, which is active in all “transforming states”. Between 1991 and 1996, he led EPP’s EU expansion group.

He has been awarded many decorations, including the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland. Also a communications expert, van Velzen currently works as a political advisor in Brussels, where I conducted this short interview with him in 2009:

JW Why is there no authentic Christian Democratic party in Poland?

WvV For a number of reasons. Because the Church in Poland was and for the most part still is very strong, it is impossible to establish a truly Christian Democratic party there – just like Spain and France.

JW Because such a party would be confused with the clergy?

WvV Yes, I believe so, and I have seen evidence to support it. And I noticed that, after the fall of communism, some Polish politicians were so ambitious they didn’t want to put aside the parties they personally had founded. They didn’t want just to be a part of a big party that had many activists, and lose control. However, another reason for the lack of a real Christian Democratic party has to do with ideological paucity.

JW Before the war, however, there was an explicitly Christian Democratic party in Poland. Did that come to nothing?

WvV After the fall of communism, when it came out of exile, it no longer had any appeal, and it failed politically.

JW What did the Church do immediately after 1989?

WvV The Church in Poland had less experience of democracy than the Church in the West, and no experience of modern democracy, so it just waited. Then, after 1991, it advised people to vote for the conservatives, but it wasn’t successful. Overall, we realised that, apart from a number of respectable clerics, the Polish Church rejected a traditional Christian democracy of the type supported by Schuman and De Gasperi. Even as a foreigner, I could see that the Polish Church was to a large extent only concerned with guaranteeing its own rights. Whether this is still the case or not, I don’t know.

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Dr Erhard Busek – Help from Austria The Christian Liberal intellectual helped shape the Christian Democrat Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP) before the fall of communism, and was for a time Deputy Mayor of Vienna, a government minister, and Vice Chancellor of Austria. He travelled to Poland with friends early on, and also Erhard Busek visited countries like Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, with which Vienna has links.

Busek, Agriculture Minister Riegler, and other ÖVP politicians supplied large quantities of used agricultural equipment to Polish farmers after 1980, even under martial law. This also helped strengthen the “Rural Solidarity” trade union.

JW Poland’s national hero Józef Pi³sudski said that of Poland’s three partition powers, the Austrians had been the easiest to bear. Did Austria feel a certain responsibility towards Poland after the last war – and was it a sentimental responsibility?

EB Pi³sudski was right. The part of Poland that was allocated to the Viennese monarchy, for example, was able to retain the Polish language. Many of the politicians in the old Austria were Polish, particularly those involved in education. The fact that “Polishness” survived best in Galicia is not without reason, since the people there were allowed to carry on speaking Polish, unlike in the Russian and Prussian partitions. Let’s not forget, for example, the university we founded in Lviv. However, people no longer knew a great deal about Poland after 1945. They knew a bit about Kraków, but most people didn’t know where Lviv was. We have the Poles to thank for reminding us Austrians about their country.

JW There were a lot of Polish emigrants in Vienna after the war. Did they hide away or become active?

EB They had and still continue to have active organisations. When martial law was imposed in 1981, I joined in demonstrations with Poles living in Austria. There is another phenomenon worth mentioning: because priests became scarce in Austria, we now have quite a few Polish helpers. Cardinal König, who has since died, played a particular role. Polish bishops travelling to Rome always made sure they paid him a visit in Vienna first.

All the Polish cardinals had close ties with Austria.

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JW Did you and your friends also proceed in consultation with European Christian Democrat organisations?

EB I myself didn’t at the beginning, but others certainly did. I had experienced the Soviets marching into Prague in 1968. That was a formative experience. At the time, I was chairman of the Austrian Federal Youth Council and secretary of the ÖVP. I had been a member of the Austrian Catholic youth organisation Katholische Jugend, and knew a lot about the situation of fellow Catholics in Prague. In 1979/80, I was asked to have a look around in Poland too. I got to know Solidarity. But I was also very concerned about the situation in Hungary and Yugoslavia and travelled to these countries. Not many people knew as many dissidents as I did. In spring 1989, I joined the Federal Government in Vienna, and thought I would have to put an end to the work I have just described. You can’t carry on smuggling printing presses when you’re a government minister.

But the Iron Curtain soon fell, thank God, and I was able to continue with my political work. Several of my friends became ministers too, and even state presidents. The next time I saw them there was a lot of rejoicing.

JW Didn’t you also publish articles in the weekly newspaper Tygodni Powszechny in Kraków?

EB That’s a very old connection. Even before, I had friends at the Catholic newspaper Die Furche in Vienna, and it was they who were in contact with Kraków (through Dr Kurt Skalnik, who worked at the Federal Chancellery for a time). That’s how we ended up sitting as friends in editor-inchief Jerzy Turowicz’s office under the famous picture of Emperor Franz Joseph.

JW Finally, I would like to ask you too why there is no Christian Democratic party in Poland, and why there is not likely to be one in the future?

EB The Clubs of Catholic Intelligentsia, which had a big part to play with regard to this problem, refused to be involved from the very beginning.

I talked about this a lot with my friend Tadeusz Mazowiecki. He bristled and said that “our” spectrum (in the UW “Freedom Union”) was broader than that covered by the EPP. Another reason they didn’t want to get involved was because the Solidarity movement (from which the UW had been drawing strength for a long time) included some left-wing groups.

I told him he was making a mistake, because one needed to belong to a “family” in Europe in order to have influence. However, he wasn’t interested.

JW How has the ÖVP been involved in Central and Eastern Europe, and in particular in Poland, in a specifically European context, first in the 118

EUCD and then in the EPP? I’m thinking of the successful merger of the two organisations in Ljubljana at that time.

EB Party leader Alois Mock, Josef Riegler (former Agriculture Minister) and I, in particular, had a few confidential meetings – which have since become public – with politicians from all the transformation states on board the “Mozart” on the Danube in Vienna, together with the Konrad Adenauer Foundation and a number of Americans. The ÖVP also became involved early on in sharing responsibility for the EPP’s activities in Poland, which began before the fall of communism. Finally, the ÖVP played and still continues to play a leading role in the Robert Schuman Foundation.

Dr Fritz König – First bridge to Poland in the European Council Born in Vienna, Fritz König went straight into politics from the Catholic youth organisation Katholische Jugend. He was a member of the Austrian parliament for 30 years. He also led the Junge Volkspartei, a political youth organisation within the ÖVP, between 1960 and 1972. Later, König held senior positions in the Fritz König EUJC and the IUJD. We met in the metropolis on the Danube, which had more contacts to the east and the southeast than anyone else during the Cold War, including to Poland.

JW When did Poland first appear on your radar, so to speak?

FK The Junge Volkspartei first made contact with Wroc³aw, via the Junge Union. A meeting with voivodeships from a larger region was organised there at quite an early stage. The discussion was very open. We felt that a different wind was blowing in Poland than in the rest of the so-called Eastern Bloc. We therefore decided that we could help relax the political atmosphere.

JW Was that before 1980?

FK Yes, just before. Later we took a delegation to Gdañsk. We met young people who believed that Solidarity was gradually eroding the powers of the country’s dictatorship. But hopes were soon dashed when, in 1984, the priest Jerzy Popie³uszko was murdered. State brutality had returned.

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JW Towards the end of martial law, and after Tadeusz Mazowiecki had been named the first democratic Prime Minister, the EPP and the ÖVP saw new opportunities to make contacts. What happened then, in practical terms?

FK We started again before 1989, when I found myself sitting with new Polish representatives in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. Relationships were strengthened. Most of our friends came from the Freedom Union (UW). We had personal relationships, but no party relationships as yet. On the whole, the trend was optimistic.

JW A different question: how did those in the Assembly deal with the break-up of Yugoslavia?

FK The ÖVP had already established contacts in Slovenia and then the other successor states, particularly with emerging democratic parties. The driving force behind this was our foreign minister, Alois Mock. He was an early proponent of recognising the drives for independence in the various states, but it soon became apparent that the Serbian leadership under Milosevic wanted to hold Tito’s state together. There followed an unhappy conference on the Brijuni Islands, at which the US and Luxembourg foreign ministers unfortunately chose – out of an ignorance of history – to back the status quo.

JW And the French? Were they not traditionally supporters of Serbia?

FK They were divided. Like the British, those supporting the status quo had a purely political attitude to the development. Slovenia and Croatia voted for independence with a huge majority. Alois Mock immediately asked me to express support for their position in the European Council.

When we discussed the matter within the EPP Group, our Polish friends were particularly helpful. However, we lost in the committee consultation (albeit by just two votes) when a few foolish British and French (not from our family) suggested we only wanted a return to monarchies in the former Yugoslavia. Needless to say, the Council of Ministers blocked the move, but the EPP Group took its resolution of support for the Slovenians and the Croatians to the plenary assembly, where it actually achieved an absolute majority. The Poles made a considerable contribution to this. The politicians in Strasbourg were therefore the first in Europe to recognise these two cases of self-determination.

JW How did you and your friends react later when Polish democrats expressed their desire for Poland to join the EU? There was after all a long interval between developments in Yugoslavia and EU expansion?

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FK There was an increase in personal contacts and group trips. Austrian Vice Chancellor Erhard Busek became particularly active; after all, he had been in contact with the Polish Church and the Clubs of Catholic Intelligentsia, particularly the one in Kraków, for some time. We in the ÖVP realised how difficult it was to secure concrete help in the European Council. However, because we had learnt from the case of Yugoslavia, we were able to provide more targeted help in Poland. For example, we supplied machinery to small farmers. The Church groups in Germany and Austria that organised this agricultural aid counted ÖVP and CDU people among their members.

Rocco Buttiglione – To Poland with books and patience Born in Gallipoli, Apulia in 1948. Vice president of the Italian Chamber of Deputies, Christian Democrat.

University career from 1972. Professor of philosophy.

President of the Italian Herder Society. Bullied out of candidacy for the European Commission in 2004 by a campaign waged by left-wing delegates and their antiChurch media mafia. Married, four children. Speaks German, English, French, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. Models his European politics on Helmut Kohl.

Rocco Buttiglione

JW When and why did you first establish contacts with Poland?

RB There was once a priest called Francesco Ricci who established close contacts with the persecuted church throughout Central and Eastern Europe in the 1960s. He used to smuggle forbidden books into these countries, and brought forbidden manuscripts out, which he would then publish in Italy. He was part of the Communion and Liberation movement, and at that time he created a special bond between his movement and the Light-Life movement in Poland, led by the charismatic Father Blachnicki.

Ricci had a small publishing house (CSEO) and a group of colleagues that used to travel with him to many countries to provide help and establish friendships where possible. He also had a small magazine that was also called CSEO (Centro Studi Europa Orientale, Eastern Europe Study Centre). I was one of his friends.

JW When and how often did you travel to Poland?

RB We were able to travel to Poland quite early on, although it was difficult to get a visa and we were checked all the time. We also had to be very careful not to compromise our friends.

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JW After the war, were you in contact with Polish emigrants as well as with Poles in Poland?

RB We mainly met Poles in Poland. We didn’t know many emigrants in the West.

JW What kind of professional groups did your Polish partners belong to?

RB I personally had contacts with groups of intellectuals in Warsaw (Club of Catholic Intelligentsia, Wiez magazine) and Kraków (Club of Catholic Intelligentsia, ZNAK magazine and weekly newspaper Tygodnik Powszechny). Other members of CSEO had contacts to Polish society, via parishes and Swiatlo Zycie. The pilgrimage to Jasna Góra (Czêstochowa) provided a particular opportunity to come into contact with Polish society.

JW Did you make any contacts with liberals?

RB Contacts with the liberal milieu did not come until later, namely the second half of the 1970s. The experience of the underground university and the mediation role played by Bronis³aw Geremek were both very significant. Seminars held by Karol Wojty³a, Archbishop of Kraków, were also important.

JW Was there anyone you could talk to about the European Christian Democrats?

RB We didn’t really talk about them in our circles. We were all convinced of the uniqueness of the Polish way. The idea was much more about building a kind of parallel society that would facilitate a more humane way of life. We didn’t want to challenge communism politically, we just wanted to serve as a witness for Christian belief and true humanity. Our goals were of a more religious and cultural nature, even though we all knew we had to somehow confront social evils and political totalitarianism.

JW Were you actively involved in providing aid to Poland?

RB Of course. The whole Communion and Liberation movement collected food and money, in particular for the families of those imprisoned and persecuted following the declaration of martial law (December 1981). CSEO was at the time heavily involved in disseminating news from Poland outside the country, and in smuggling materials for civil resistance into the country. It was important for the police to realise that the victims of persecution were well known in the West, and enjoyed widespread support.

This meant no-one could disappear without it being noticed.

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JW Why do you think Christian Democratic parties have so far failed to survive and flourish in Poland although many have been founded?

RB They didn’t really fail. It would have been a mistake back then to create a Western-style Christian Democratic party. Solidarity was purely and simply the “party of the nation”. General Jaruzelski probably wanted to have a Christian Democratic party in order to break the united front of resistance. Solidarity was in any case a “party” of Christian social ethics, and thus had many Christian Democratic traits.

JW Why did good people like Mazowiecki and others lose so much influence over the processes of democratisation and innovation?

RB Solidarity was the result of cooperation between workers and intellectuals. This led to the emergence of an all-Polish national movement. This movement was symbolised by Lech Wa³êsa and Tadeusz Mazowiecki. When they began to disagree with each other, the people no longer had any clear orientation.

JW However, after a break, a new party emerged in the political centre, which came as a surprise to the West. What was your experience of this?

RB Prior to the referendum on Poland joining the EU, I had a small role in encouraging Catholic groups to inform the people as to why their country should join. This is also part of the early history of Civic Platform (PO).

JW And how should PO proceed in the future in order to strengthen democracy?

RB It needs to preserve what it inherited from Solidarity, as that is helpful to Christian Democratic thought. We have had a few decades of secularisation in the West. But one could even ask the question: how can a Christian party survive in a post-Christian age? Solidarity challenged communism from a Christian standpoint and it won. PO needs to retain this spirit.

JW Has the PO itself become more European since Poland joined the EU, e.g. with its group in the European Parliament?

RB Yes, certainly, but not at the expense of its own profile and identity.

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Positions after the split from the Kaczyñski group We soon had the impression that the PC’s poor performance in the October 1991 elections was having an effect. Those who had joined the PC in the spring found they had no say, particularly in the Sejm. Tadeusz Mazowiecki’s UW was not strong, but it had a solid following. Consequently, the EPP and the EPP Group made it clear that they believed they had a long road ahead of them as far as party development in Poland was concerned.

EPP delegates began in particular to move their activities from Warsaw to the Polish provinces. The EUCD and the EPP continued to woo UD/ UW members, and began by sending out information, although this was not yet in Polish. Naturally, the EPP Group supported Brussels’ decision to change the amount of aid it gave to Poland. Thus it was that friends of Poland were irritated when Bronis³aw Geremek held up Finnish independence as an example to the Solidarity party in the Sejm: neutrality instead of the road to Brussels?

Talks with Geremek were intensified. And then a political miracle occurred: the Freedom Union rejected Geremek’s objections, aligned itself with Mazowiecki and voted to join the EPP. It was given observer status. The number of Polish Schuman stagiaires increased. One such stagiaire was Andrzej Potocki, UW party spokesman for a time. I invited him to EPP study days in London.

Dr Zygmunt Drozdek, who had unexpectedly helped to found Centre Agreement (PC), returned to his plan to create a Christian Democratic educational institution in 1991, and then again later on. I must point out that the plan failed, but I am mentioning it because of another experience.

We had told Drozdek that neither the CDU nor the EPP could become financially involved because it was simply too early. At the same time, we asked why the Church could not set up a Catholic academy with a social and socio-political focus, as the church in Germany, Austria and the Netherlands had done. And would it not be easier to receive financial help from Western sources than from a political party?

We never received an answer, but that was not Drozdek’s fault. Like with the fabled “agricultural project”, it turned out that Poland’s church was overstretched with such problems, at least to begin with. We also began to suspect something that, some years later, turned out to be true: Poland’s church had initially recommended parties that were explicitly Catholic, but had then abandoned them when they were defeated or made mistakes.

This realism, which had long been in force in the West, was also responsible for halting the project favoured by Drozdek and his friends.

This made our individual speeches and our Europe seminars even more important. A Europe society was set up in Gliwice, and it was not the only one. The MEPs Marlene Lenz (CDU/D), Elmar Brok (CDU/D) and 124

Raf Chantérie (CVP/B) explained how the European bodies worked. Van Velzen’s working group received regular reports on Poland, which were then put into action within the EPP Group.

The question of Poland joining the EU came up increasingly in 1991 and even more in 1992. Prejudices abounded, but ultimately they were not as damaging as ignorance. As already mentioned, our seminars showed the extent to which knowledge about the European idea and its concrete consequences was lacking, even in major university cities.

I would like to venture here to write a few lines about an experience I had near Lublin. During the martial law period, I gave a talk on the future of Europe in the crypt of a church. There were more than 60 Solidarity officials present. A railwayman in uniform became excited: “So when we join you in a united Europe, we will free Lviv together!” Some clapping, then my friend Dana spoke: “Right now it’s not about conquering Lviv, it’s about you regaining your ability to think.” The debate carried on until 1 am.

Things soon turned sour. Quarrels in the ranks of the “ruling opposition”, not to mention vicious plotting, led to the downfall first of the Olszewski government (PC), and then – after an interlude with Waldemar Pawlak – the government of the next Prime Minister Hanna Suchocka.

The left was gradually gaining ground and claiming government seats.

During this period, Aleksander Kwaœniewski became state president.

What was the EPP to do now? It quickly became clear that the new president wanted to join NATO and the EU, the sooner the better. Józef Oleksy presided over the Sejm for a time, and he too was pulling strongly in the same direction. The EPP was as keen as the governments in the EU to support the new Polish government. First of all, it had been elected, and secondly, nearly all Polish ministers recognised what was at stake. Thankfully, we can remember that our approach was understood by those who formed the AWS in 1996, and later the PO, which is currently in power. I would like to add personally that we were supported by both Kwaœniewski and Oleksy when we fought for EU reforms in the Brussels Convention. This was also the experience of Elmar Brok, who coordinated EPP powers at Convention consultations.

1992 – The EUCD ventures a new attempt in Warsaw After the fall of communism, it was decided to allow the EUCD to exist alongside the EPP, even though the EUCD no longer had any basis. The Western “Christian” parties believed that the reunification of Europe, which Pope John Paul II had evoked in the European Parliament as early as 1988, should lead to a merger of the EUCD with the EPP. The conference in Warsaw on 21-23 June 1992 was the first step in this new direction.

In Brussels, people were also thinking primarily about a new attempt to unify the political centre in Poland. This was risky after the collapse of 125

EPP founder Leo Tindemans (B)

Transitions: merger of EUCD/EPP; GS Klaus Welle, Wim van Velzen

Polish conservative politician Jan Rokita

the PC. In the run-up to the conference, a committee was established in Warsaw under the leadership of Prime Minister Jan Olszewski. The aim of this was to acknowledge Olszewski’s independence. Tomasz Jackowski represented the Labour Party, even though the EUCD too had rejected its claim to lead all Christian Democrats in Poland.

Conservatives like Jan Rokita were invited. Hopes were also pinned on a “Christian Democratic Forum” in Poznañ, which had been thrown together in a hurry, and to which small “Christian” parties made haste. However, the project’s reputation quickly suffered, since the old PAX Association, the first pseudo-Catholic invention of the Polish communists, had also made a U-turn for Poznañ. Its dubious triumph consisted of fat finances, which it offered shamelessly in order to gain access. The West was represented more strongly than it had ever been at EUCD conferences. The conference was presided over by Emilio Colombo, Italian prime minister between 1970 and 1972. His colleagues Helmut Kohl (D), Lubbers (NL), Andreotti (I) and Peterle (SL) were at his side. President Lech Wa³êsa gave a reception. Faithful Poland champion and Austrian vice chancellor Erhard Busek came from Vienna. The EPP was represented by president Wilfried Martens (B) and party chief Egon Klepsch (D). The keynote speech was given by Leo Tindemans (B), president of the EPP when it was founded in 1976, who made it quite clear that although Christian Democrats were not conservatives, they could cooperate with them.

Unfortunately, it quickly became clear in the EPP organisations that the Forum conference had not come up with anything that could be used to unite the individual Polish parties gathered there. Nor did the Poznañ conference, which was more improvised than thought through, have any effect: it only succeeded in provoking personal quarrels. Too many people wanted to merge their troops but remain generals.

The Polish parties made solemn promises to the EUCD to create a strong centre party. There were also a few party changes in the Sejm. But that was it. We were forced to recognise that even the presence of 14 pro-EUCD parties from Eastern and Central Eastern Europe in Warsaw was not enough set the Poles in action. One year on, and it was time to pay for the failures and hesitations.

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The return to power of the Polish united left (SLD) The splintering of the centre forces made the “post-communists” so strong (20.4%) at the new Sejm elections in 1993 that their SLD ship was able to set sail with PSL’s Pawlak at the helm. The PSL had received 15.4%, the UW 10.6%. The election thresholds had worked, which came as a great shock.

Nevertheless, the number of democrats involved in the political process decreased rather than increased. Young people in particular held back, firstly because they felt very frustrated, and secondly because veteran opposition members did not allow them to take up any promising positions. Klaus Welle, Secretary General of the EPP Group, said resignedly, “We have told them time and again that we like them and that they’re good friends of ours, but that we can’t get anywhere in Europe with six, 12 or 16 partner parties. What’s the point of ideas if the people who have them don’t go on to study political practice?”

We in the West also contributed to the lack of clarity. The European Democratic Union (EDU), in which British and other conservatives set the tone, but in which the German Christian Democrats also played a part, accepted the Polish PC and KLD apparently without hesitation, and also encouraged Aleksander Hall to join. This irritated the “Christian” parties in Italy and the Benelux states with their consciously Christian social orientation.

The Poles could not be criticised for this, as the situation was unclear.

And they stuck with the Mazowiecki group, albeit with some reservations.

Soon after the fall of communism, the delegates from this group – which was first the Democratic Union (UD) but later became the Freedom Union (UW) – spread themselves across several parties in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, from Christian Democratic parties to liberals and socialists. The ZChN joined the conservatives in Strasbourg, the KPN the Gaullists, who were still independent at the time.

We reacted by continuing with our plan. We invited more people to Brussels and Strasbourg and tried to find out why some Western policies were being misinterpreted. Seminars with former Robert Schuman Foundation stagiaires were helpful in this respect. The Polish Robert Schuman Foundation was interested in limited cooperation, and we made friends there. However, it soon became clear that the Polish foundation wanted to keep its distance from the parties, which was completely understandable at the time. Today, the most active woman in the Polish foundation, Ró¿a Gräfin von Thun und Hohenstein, is an MEP for the PO. This is very gratifying.

Talks by some EPP politicians with the Catholic Church revealed that the bishops were becoming careful about giving out advice in advance of elections, in view of the participation of prominent Catholics in the “shift127

ing sand dune” of parties, which kept changing their names, leaderships and manifestos. At the same time, we kept hearing from Rome how Poland should join the EU, supported by proven friends. Although the Pope, who had talked with Polish opposition politicians before the fall of communism, did not tell his countrymen which parties to back with regard to the chances of Warsaw joining the EU, he did see to it that the primate went to Brussels with a few bishops in order to shake off prejudices.

In 1996, several of the democratic forces in Poland had had enough of the return of the left wing. It was true that this had to do partly with maintaining Church rights, but it had more to do with the fight against corruption and moral decay. Liberals, Christian Democratic groups, conservatives and independents all began talking to Solidarity activists, not about a party merger but about forming a large alliance. This gave rise to Solidarity Electoral Action. The EPP reacted in astonishment – and delight. The “AWS” was led by trade union boss Marian Krzaklewski. Krzaklewski was not exactly professional and ambitious, but maybe this was why he was able to unite and unify people, for example by means of procrastination.

In 1997, two miraculous things happened: firstly, the AWS stood firm and went into the 1997 Sejm elections comparatively united; secondly, it won 33.8% of the vote. Jerzy Buzek became the only Polish prime minister to remain in office for an entire legislative period after being elected.

Unfortunately, he was not able to put an end to some of the bad habits that had become established in the Sejm, such as party switching, a lack of voting discipline, and leadership quarrels. Buzek aides-de-camp defected to PiS, which Jaros³aw Kaczyñski had set up with a group of well-known nationalistic right-wingers.

Of more importance was the fact that AWS supporters became involved in setting up the Civic Platform (PO), a move that was initially greeted with some amusement by the media. There was no future for what was left of the AWS. At the Sejm elections in 2001, the alliance won just 5.6% of the vote, before disappearing completely.

The failure of the AWS, Kaczyñski’s new manoeuvres, not to mention all kinds of other digressions, all conspired to make the EPP’s search for a partner even harder. A few footnotes: In the spring of 2000, Jan Rokita was elected leader of the partially pro-European Conservatives (now SKL). Rokita had only left the Mazowiecki camp in 1997. However, even when he was elected, Rokita felt that he was not being joined by “real” conservatives, who were still on the lookout for new positions.

In autumn 1997, Adam Krzemiñski, a clever and experienced journalist, wrote in the Hamburg Zeit newspaper that the AWS could well turn into a Polish CDU. The direction seemed right, but there was a lack of officers. After the collapse of the AWS, Krzemiñski could no longer make any new predictions.

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In September 1996, the year the AWS was founded, the Konrad Adenauer Foundation asked several CDU politicians to be sure to attend the next UW party conference. This was an expression of the hope that the UW could still play a role in harmony with the EPP. There was a lot of talk around at that time about when Poland might join the EU, and both Wim van Velzen and the CDU believed that, with experienced UW politicians in tow, they would be well placed to score points in Brussels when the time came. The brutal reality was that the coexistence of the UW and the AWS was the undoing of both.

Dr Zygmunt Drozdek and his group of non-party political friends again suggested setting up a Christian Social educational centre, this time based in Toruñ. I am not mentioning this because the EPP dismissed it again, but because, in 1996/97, we were in the middle of a situation that was becoming increasingly unclear, despite the progress of the PO. Nevertheless, the EPP and the EPP Group had learnt one thing, and that was that Poland’s parliament was working better in spite of the troubles mentioned above. People and parties had succeeded in “classifying” its work, with the help of electoral thresholds amongst other factors. The wind had changed, and bishops no longer provided assistance to parties running for election. Respect for the Church increased as it assumed its correct place and kept out of elections. We increased our focus on the problems of Poland joining the EU, and assumed that we would have delegates from several parties in the end.

Although van Velzen’s working group received the above-mentioned current reports from the “East”, it did not yet have a statement from the EPP as a whole and from the EPP Group concerning EU membership for former communist countries. As a result, the EPP Group’s “study days” in Helsinki (28-30 August 1996) were decisively significant. All our major partners spoke at this event, including Hanna Suchocka on behalf of Poland and the UW. Wim van Velzen was the main speaker for the EPP Group. Below is an excerpt from his speech: “What can we as the European People’s Party do together with our friends in Central and Eastern Europe to help facilitate the democratic transformation process? In my opinion, this gives rise to important questions that we must ask ourselves. Firstly, we must emphasise that we have decided finally to unite and integrate the European People’s Party and the European Union of Christian Democrats. We need to ensure that at the end of this millennium there is only one strong Christian Democratic grouping. However, this will make new demands on us: we will need to change our operating principles and be prepared to consider problems in Central and Eastern Europe. We therefore need to reorient ourselves. That is easy to say, but we are called upon to make more effort in this area in the coming years.

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The help that we provide is urgently required, as the next two or three years will be a decisive phase in Central and Eastern Europe. Parliamentary elections are due to take place again in several of these countries in 1997 and 1998. These will determine the composition of parliaments, which will for the first time be negotiating with us regarding EU membership and expansion. If there are no strong Christian Democratic and allied parties in these countries, we will be seated at the negotiating table with parties that are not from our family. We must therefore increase the help we are offering to those parties close to us with respect to bridge-building, overcoming divisions and building fronts together with other pro-Europeans, so that there will be sufficient parliamentary majorities. This is very difficult even in our own countries. It is therefore all the more important that we recognise that we will not achieve anything in Central and Eastern Europe if we do not agree on our plan for cooperation.”

The Buzek government came into power in 1997. A few weeks later, in November 1997, the EPP approved its document on eastward expansion at its 11th party conference, which was held in Toulouse. Below is an abridged version of the document.

“The success of the European Union, including expanding the number of member states, is in the interest of all Europeans” Those peoples in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe who were forced into communist oppression after the catastrophe of the Second World War have fought to secure their freedom and independence by means of a peaceful revolution. For these peoples, Europe is a symbol of democracy, human rights, the rule of law and a free market economy. The peoples of these countries, and of Cyprus and Malta, want to join the European Union because they support its goals as specified in the preamble of the 1957 Rome Treaty, namely “[to lay] the foundations of an ever closer union among the peoples of Europe, [and, through this union] to preserve and strengthen peace and liberty”. The European Union is open to all European democracies that meet the criteria for membership.

The EPP is convinced that the European Union is obliged to open itself up to the countries of Central and Eastern Europe for political and moral reasons. Not only is it in these countries’ political and economic interest to join the European Union, it is also in the interest of the European Union and its member states. The accession countries, the European Union and all its member states must all make the necessary political, economic and financial efforts to ensure the expansion is a success, without endangering the balance that exists between the member states currently in the 130

Union. What is at stake here is in essence the security of the whole continent of Europe. Because the fundamental goals of the Union are to create and maintain freedom, security, stability, economic development, social justice and solidarity in Europe, the effects of expansion should be judged primarily according to these criteria. The EPP would like to emphasise that the financial aspects of expansion should not undermine the principles of solidarity and the economic and social cohesion that exist within the Union.

Accession to the European Union by the Central and Eastern European countries shall be dependent upon the realisation of democracy and the rule of law, the acknowledgement of human rights and the rights of ethnic minorities, the existence of market economy systems, and acceptance of the Community acquis. The need to observe political criteria, particularly in the area of democratisation, was emphasised several times in the Treaty of Amsterdam.

The EPP is convinced that, as part of the expansion process, the European Union should strengthen the ongoing structured dialogue with all the countries that have signed a European agreement with the EU, by beginning an expansion dialogue with immediate effect. Such an ongoing “expansion dialogue” would make it possible to tackle all political topics relating to the EU, including the institutional development of the EU. It would give the acceding countries the opportunity to influence EU policies in the context of a multilateral informal network even prior to full accession, and to adopt these policies and thus prepare for expansion whilst observing the Community acquis …

The rhythm of negotiations and the final deadline will depend on the extent to which the individual membership candidates meet the conditions for entry. The negotiations that take place between the EU and the membership candidates will be bilateral. Each country will be assessed on the basis of its individual developments with regard to meeting the Community acquis. The EPP would like to emphasise that it will begin by initiating intensive individual talks with those countries that have advanced the furthest.

The EPP expressly supports … the proposals put forward by the Commission. It is also necessary to find ways and means of introducing the authorities in the acceding countries to the structures of the Union prior to accession. Particular attention should be paid to the modernisation measures taken by the authorities in those acceding countries that have Community and other funds to administrate…

The EPP believes that the “Europe Conference” proposed by the Commission can be an important instrument of political cooperation with regard to the CFSP and cooperation in the areas of justice and domestic affairs. The “Europe Conference” should take place once a year and be open to heads of state and government as well as the presidents of the 131

Commission and the European Parliament, as recommended by the Commission. It should also be open to all EU member states and all European states seeking membership that are linked to the Union via an Association Agreement …

In order to smooth the way to expansion, the EPP considers the following institutional reforms necessary: reform of the decision-making procedure (decision dependent on a qualified majority in the Council of Ministers and co-decision by the European Parliament, a reweighting of votes in the Council of Ministers, and reform of the composition of the Commission). These reforms should be implemented as soon as possible, in order to enable the first countries to join in 2002/2003.”

The EPP gave a sigh of relief in 1997 and took some of the credit for the AWS victory. But it was mistaken. Things continued to muddle along.

We switched to the “wait” mode.

Between 22 and 24 October 1999, the EPP held an „Expansion Forum” in the reunified Berlin, which featured speakers from all the countries seeking to join the EU at the time. In the meantime, the UW politician Jan Ku³akowski, with whom many of us were friends, was holding talks in Brussels. Not only had Ku³akowski held a senior position in the International Federation of Christian Trade Unions, he had also been active within the Polish opposition from an early stage, and was a friend of Tadeusz Mazowiecki. The Berlin forum showed how difficult some of the EU negotiations were, particularly in the area of agriculture as far as Poland was concerned. Soon after, Jerzy Buzek appointed Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, who was an AWS sympathiser, to the role of Europe Minister (Polish: Head of the Committee for European Integration, UKIE).

In 2000, the EPP included the following “Eastern Europe” items in its current annual programme: y Further meetings between Wim van Velzen’s working group in Warsaw and the party in Strasbourg. Agreement on proceedings with conservatives in the EDU. Strengthening of the cooperation between foundations associated with “Christian” parties. The dispatch of even more MEPs to Central and Eastern European countries during election campaigns. y The EPP accompanied the development of Poland with increasing scepticism, and established that the electoral alliance AWS had not made any moves towards the oft-invoked new centre party. Then, on 23 September 2001, the outcome of the Polish parliamentary elections sent shockwaves through the political landscape. The vote was fatal for the AWS. As a coalition grouping, it was required to clear a hurdle of 8%, but it only managed 5.6% and lost all its seats as a result.

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Back in Brussels, and also in cooperation with the Adenauer Foundation in Warsaw, we carried out the most fundamental assessment of a Polish election since 1991. We looked into how all Poles – young and old, men and women, employed and self-employed, from the east and the west of the country – had voted. Reliable survey data was compiled in Poland too.

Some of the results were very interesting: y Turnout was still just 46%. Only 38% of young people voted, claiming they were “sick of politics”. y The SLD achieved 41%; PO, which had only been founded in spring 2001, 13%. The destructive agrarian Self-Defence Party achieved just 10%. In fourth place was the new Kaczyñski party PiS. The PSL did well, winning some 9% of the vote, the radical clerical LPR some 8%.

The UW disappeared… y Four out of six parliamentary groupings were now based on new rather than old parties. The “reformed” communists were recognised as the most “social” party, and the PSL felt it had at last been fully recognised as a democratic party. It became very clear that victory was unlikely to be achieved with an expressly Christian Democratic party.

What was more important was the ability to make a convincing connection between preserving values and modernising. They had begun to do this in the PO. Liberal and Social Conservative forces were getting together. The EPP had been paying visits to the new PO, and inviting its representatives to Brussels and Strasbourg, since the party first began to form. Nothing came of the Polish conservative wish to be accepted into the EPP. Why and how was the UW beaten in 2001? In December 2000, they had replaced Balcerowicz as chairman with Geremek, who nevertheless only beat Gdañsk Senator Donald Tusk by 338 votes to 261. Geremek’s allies then made a cardinal error, only leaving two seats on the party’s 100-member national council to Tusk‘s allies. We were not sure whether the EPP could breathe a sigh of relief. After all, the UW was an associate member of the EPP. However, when Geremek turned up to the EPP congress in Berlin in January 2001, he had been beaten and voted out of office.

I reminded colleagues in the EPP that Geremek had been the only delegate to abstain when the UW council had decided to join the EPP, following a proposal from Balcerowicz. Even Mazowiecki had voted in favour. Everything seemed perfect. But then we heard that Geremek had paid a “private” visit in Brussels to Pat Cock, the most senior liberal in the European Parliament.

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It turned out that people were already considering “where they were going to sit” in Strasbourg, and Geremek and his friends seemed to think that what had “gone well” in the European Council would be possible again, namely the distribution of UW MEPs across several groups within the European Parliament. For some prominent UW women, this meant joining the EPP, but for others it meant joining the Liberals. This disappointed all the pro-Poland supporters in the EPP Group. When all the UW members who had first joined the EPP Group later switched to the Liberals, this was at least consistent and in line with what Geremek had intended. To my surprise, Geremek never could understand that this put paid to any chance of him ever becoming president of the European Parliament.

So much for the review and anticipation in evaluating the 2001 Sejm election. The free-fall of the UW also led to Geremek’s being voted out as chairman straight after the election. He was replaced by the left-winger W³adys³aw Frasyniuk of Wroc³aw. The UW shrank and lost good people to the PO. When Geremek came to Berlin, all he heard was the request to discuss the road to Strasbourg with the PO and the rest of the Poznañ forum. Had Poland already elected MEPs at the time, every second one would have gone to the left.

When the PO won its first Sejm victory, it impressed observers by holding preliminary elections (similar to “primaries”) aimed at finding out how its various wings were arranged, where it had which “Stimmführer” (individual delegates authorised to cast all votes on behalf of a specific region), and how it could best win (based on a survey carried out within the party). Jan Rokita, previously in the conservative SKL and now in the PO (his fourth party), secured a third of the new PO party for himself and his friends. Some people did not approve of this, but the EPP was delighted: after preaching its message of “Strength through a United Centre” for the past twelve years, it looked as if things were finally going to plan.

After the failure of the AWS, Leszek Miller was appointed prime minister of Poland. In Brussels, President Kwaœniewski kept up his call for Poland to have a strong position in the expanded EU. The EPP working group led by Wim van Velzen had come up with plans for delegates from Poland and other countries to be allowed to enter the European Parliament as “observers” if the “new” states were to be allowed to join before the next regular European elections. This solution had been tried out in Germany, because despite German reunification on 3 October 1990, East Germans had not been allowed to stand in European elections until later.

The new “acceding countries”, which actually joined in 2004, did not get their “observers” in Strasbourg without a fight. The EPP Group fought hardest for the interim solution.

In October 2002, the EPP received a list of names of prospective Polish members. On 18 November, the nominated observers arrived in Strasbourg for a special session. The EPP-ED Group did everything it could to 134

provide the “newcomers” with as much information as possible and to make a note of their wishes. They had not all been involved in preliminary talks in their countries.

In May 2003, we took stock again: who joined us straight away, who joined later, who joined and then left? It is hard to believe today, but Adam Bielan, the right-wing admirer of General Franco, joined the EPP– ED! Zbigniew Chrzanowski came from the old SKL. A number of PO mandatories, including Janusz Lewandowski and Bogdan Klich, were already with us, along with three PiS representatives, including Micha³ Kamiñski, who had no sympathy at all for the EPP line. Andrzej Grzyb of PSL, who has since become very successful, began back then and helped improve the image of PSL, which was not known in the West at the time.

My friend Andrzej Galazewski (PO) brought along a man from Upper Silesia, Edmund Wittbrodt, who had helped us since the first contact seminars. Wittbrodt was not affiliated to any party, but was also known because of his participation in the “Convention” discussions, in which Poland excelled itself. Something that both amazed and irritated us at the time was the fact that there were no female observers. We could not have known that by 2010, there would be numerous excellent PO women in Strasbourg.

PiS people had left, although a few stayed around for a while longer.

Then they all wanted to join the conservative UEN group, which was led by the Gaullists. And in 2009, when they felt the UEN was also too European for them, they joined with ultra-conservative Britons and Czech rightwingers to form a new group.

So far as my friends and I were concerned, the time of prospecting and holding discussions in Poland was coming to an end. We had made many friends, and still continued to do so. Cooperation with the PO and the PSL is working. In Brussels and Strasbourg, the Polish democratic centre politicians allied to the EPP work first and foremost to represent the interests of their voters, but they also make a significant contribution to joint objective formulation.

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Civic Platform (PO) and People’s Party (PSL) as partners What was left, then, of Christianity in politics, and why are there no Christian Democrats in the land between the Oder and the Bug? It is true that we do not see them waving banners and flags, but they can be heard nevertheless. This is no more than we have hoped for and dreamt of since 1988/89. There are many women and men of Christian Democratic orientation in the PO and the PSL, more than in some West European parties. In 2010, a Christian Liberal climate, founded on solid tradition, predominates in the Polish coalition in Warsaw, and this is useful and effective in Brussels too. Some aspects of this climate, for example Radio Maryja, are of secondary importance, but are nevertheless overvalued by the media. The young generation in the government camp knows that its future lies in Europe, and this is key if the dreams of Europe’s founding fathers are to become a reality. Some people complain about crises, but we know that unification has gone from “one crisis to the next” since 1950.

As the leading Polish party, PO, led by Donald Tusk, is now part of the top group in Brussels. The prime minister was awarded the famous Charlemagne Prize on Ascension Day 2010. Previous winners include Schuman, Adenauer and Geremek. The EPP is proud that the Charlemagne prizewinner Tusk belongs to its ranks.

One day in the winter of 1988, Andrzej Kostarczyk introduced me to a large, powerful man with a determined expression: “This is Józef Œlisz.

He’s been active for a long time, and has the backing of a lot of farmers in Poland.” Œlisz pressed a green Tygodnik Rolników into my hand, the magazine of the farmers’ Rural Solidarity union.

The “self-governing trade union” Solidarity, which was founded in early September 1980 and was a project in the world of industry, was not (officially) approved again until 5 April 1989, in the run-up to the Round

EPP leaders in Warsaw: 1998, 2003, 2009: Daul, Pawlak, Martens, Tusk, Saryusz-Wolski

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Donald Tusk, Charlemagne Prize recipient 2010, German Chancellor Angela Merkel

Table Talks. Œlisz, on the other hand, fared better under General Jaruzelski’s martial law; as early as 1986, pressure began to ease on the farmers led by the staunchly anti-communist southern Pole. We in the West were aware of this in the context of Catholic Church aid for Poland’s agriculture, and in talks with Lech Wa³êsa’s friends, whom Œlisz unfortunately accused early on of “capitulating” to the regime.

At our first meeting, which took place in Warsaw, Œlisz was thinking about Western aid for Poland, and described deficiencies in the marketing of agricultural products. But even then, he had already begun to be interested in Poland joining the EU. Because the Austrian Christian Democrats were helping the farmers in southern Poland with machinery, Œlisz was familiar with the ÖVP’s line on Europe, and demanded, “What are the Germans doing?” There followed a short lecture on the influence of the CDU in the EPP. I was still under the illusion that Poland’s tradition of agricultural parties with different tendencies could be rounded off in the future with the development of a single civil “collective party” that included local politicians. I was not sufficiently aware of the historical opposition between town and country in Poland. When, however, Œlisz informed me as to the historical background of the farmers, I changed my mind and asked Egon Klepsch to schedule sufficient time for the political agrarian sector on any future visits to Poland.

I was encouraged in this by friends who said Œlisz saw himself as “the new Witos”. Who was Witos? I caught up on missed lessons, because hardly anyone in the EPP Group knew much about the specialised history of Polish agrarian politics, apart from Otto von Habsburg of course.

The creation of Polish farmers’ associations, some of which developed later on into formal parties, was driven by two factors: firstly, at the end of the 19th century, by the spread of the consequences of the papal code of social ethics to the agricultural land; and secondly, by the adaptation of these consequences to the varying conditions that existed in Poland, which had at the time been split into three for the past four generations.

The first Polish People’s Party, which was in effect an agrarian party, was founded in 1895 in Rzeszów in southern Poland/Austria. The socalled PSL “Piast” was originally supported both by the clergy and by wealthy farmers. The party name was and still is a problem for us in the West, because the Polish word for people is the same as the Polish word for farmers. Lud = people, ludowiec = agricultural official, ludowy = rural or “of the people”. For this reason, the EPP was for years referred to as an “agrarian party” in Poland.

The national liberal spirit in Austrian regions, the authorisation of the use of the Polish language in universities (unlike in the Prussian and Russian zones), and even tolerance towards Jews all promoted a critical spirit throughout Galicia and in towns like Lemberg and Kraków. In 1914, 137

the left-wing farmers left the PSL. The new “PSL Lewica” had and still continues to this day to have trend followers. Poland’s farmers therefore split into several parties or at least groups after both the First and the Second World Wars.

In the Russian part of Poland, the farmers were so oppressed that they were fighting for freedom rather than prosperity. Nowadays, we must also take into consideration the fact that they only lived with other agrarian parties between 1918 and 1939, in a country that was ruled as a dictatorship for many years and was not really liberated in 1945. When the newly reformed joint agrarian party PSL, led by Prime Minister Stanis³aw Miko³ajczyk, was broken up a few years after 1945, the communists, who were well prepared, turned it into the bloc party ZSL, which became composed of defectors, anti-democrats and, until 1980, increasingly greedy and often extremely stupid officials. Because Moscow did not want to force complete kolkhozisation on Poland, as its only subjugated country, ZSL bigwigs seized the fertiliser trade, dairies, petrol stations, specialist colleges and export companies, as well as farms.

A few of them even continued to hang around these fleshpots after the fall of communism. Farmers’ leader Józef Œlisz and his supporters fought them tirelessly. Œlisz was not just angry about ZSL bigwigs like corrupt former Sejm Marshal Roman Malinowski, he even accused Lech Wa³êsa’s Solidarity of having “betrayed my farmers” in 1989, after Tadeusz Mazowiecki had formed his government. He was referring to representation as well as material provision. Œlisz was then elected deputy marshal of the new Senate. Nevertheless, he continued to agitate, and picked a fight with farmers who were considering a future role in the re-established PSL. Nearly all the leaders were replaced. New arrival Waldemar Pawlak replaced Œlisz as leader of the party and demonstrated “new independence”.

The rising star first formed a coalition with the post-communists, was himself prime minister for a time, then later switched to the side of the civil collective parties, before finally becoming a reasonably stable partner of the PO. Today he is Minister of Economic Affairs under PO leader and Prime Minister Donald Tusk. Pawlak never became a political crowd-puller, but he unites devout country people, and is happy to behave as if he needs to protect them from the excesses of Brussels.

It continued to be difficult for the EPP to establish contacts with the Polish farmers’ leaders under the circumstances described above. Not until the end of exploratory talks did the relationship between the PSL and the leadership of the EPP become normalised and fruitful, through the induction of Polish friends into the way things work in the European Union.

A few Polish friends did not join the EPP Group. Today’s PSL MEPs make a constructive contribution, unlike the earliest PSL representatives who felt they had nothing in common with Christian Democratic Euro-politics.

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Another Polish farmers’ leader from the south of the country, Jan Koz³owski (1929–1996), proved that his people could also make great contributions to political development without sharing the same beliefs as those held by Œlisz. Koz³owski came from near Sandomierz, a “corner of Austria” where the farmers had similar ideas to their comrades in the more easterly Galicia. A friend of Koz³owski’s said, “We were an early version of what are today called Social Liberals. We even criticised the Church on occasion, and had plans for reform.” In short, they Jan Kozlowski: were still infected with Viennese Josephinism.

“Your opportunity.

When Jan Koz³owski created his Solidarity of Solidarity.” “individual farmers”, he called for “equal rights for all who work on the land – whether they are farmers or farmhands or workmen who depend on the land”. This sounded “left-wing” to “large” farmers in central Poland. Œlisz’ historical role model Wincenty Witos was always sufficiently leftwing that a statue of him was erected some 50 years ago close to the Warsaw parliament, at the foot of which even communists were quick to lay wreaths. Witos, who was also a farmer in the southeast (Tarnów), and one-time member of the Empire Council in Vienna, led the Polish government three times between 1920 and 1926, but failed to heal the rifts between both the farmers and members of other professions. In the end, unfortunately, he was defeated by Marshal Józef Pi³sudski and all kinds of nationalists.

Witos, who liked to see himself as a “grassroots farmer”, represented a few tendencies that had also existed in France but that were dying out in the West, including the “battle between the country and those people in the towns”. It was therefore partly because of Polish farming tradition, Œlisz once told me, that he and other “real farmers’ leaders” even today never wear ties.

This led to a close call when, on 12 No- Example without a tie: vember 1989, Œlisz said to me in Warsaw: farmers’ leader Witos “Please can you introduce me to Helmut Kohl.” Chancellor Kohl was giving a reception in the Marriott Hotel that evening in honour of Tadeusz Mazowiecki. I responded innocently, “OK Józef, but you’ll have to wear a tie.” He looked shocked and refused in spite of my encouragement: “I can’t, because it’s bound to be on television, and 139

my people will see me with that thing around my neck.” We took him along for talks in the evening, unfortunately not with the Chancellor.

Koz³owski did not have any such problems. Why not? Because, since the 1970s, he had used his children’s contacts with Warsaw and other opportunities to get to know left-wing critics from the working classes, the KOR (Workers’ Defence Committee), progressive priests and teachers. As a result, he suspected – rightly – that any future opposition would have to be both strong and pluralistic if it wanted to achieve a breakthrough to democracy. He knew that he would never be as successful at pretending his “Rural Solidarity” was a trade union as Wa³êsa had been, with Mazowiecki’s help. If he were still alive today, he could certainly take credit for the fact that the present-day PSL is a type of People’s Reform Party with Christian Social traits, because he was convinced there was a new “third estate” living in rural Poland that was looking for its political place.

So far as the EPP is concerned, we have been able to reach the conclusion that our two Polish partners, the PO and the PSL, are currently tackling the strategic problem of “middle class voters living in small towns and the countryside”. It is not easy – depending on the region. They will need to analyse the problem together but then apply different tactics if they are to resolve it.

It is encouraging to see that PSL politicians in Brussels and Strasbourg are not restricting themselves to agricultural policy and regional development, but are widening their areas of competence. However, there is still one problem that exists today, namely the political survival in the PSL of dubious politicians from days gone by, whom the EPP Group delegation and its President Egon Klepsch met in the Sejm in 1988.

In 2008, an event verging on an anniversary conference was held in Zbosza Du³a in central Poland to honour the early efforts of Œlisz and Koz³owski. There were of course some controversial contributions. Fortunately it was possible to separate the real and legitimate “self-defence” of the farmers (complete with democratic progress) from the self-deception and downright malicious polemic voiced by partners of the Kaczyñski twins. The PO and the PSL both need to know what can be a European people’s party in the future and what cannot.

Postscript 1 My diary entries were often no cause for rejoicing. We would set off in one direction, make a mistake, then be forced to turn around. New beginnings often resembled old ones. I would sometimes talk long into the night with friends, in particular Andrzej Kostarczyk and Andrzej Szczypiorski (1928–2000).

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Szczypiorski was annoyed until his death by the fact that the German correspondents in Warsaw seemed to think the country was becoming increasingly “right-wing”. And the Archbishop of Gniezno, Henryk Muszyñski, believed – not without reason – that many Poles in some respects behaved like the French: “The French get enthusiastic about someone and then they get fed up with him after a few years.” One thing we underestimated at the time was the extent to which the corrupt nomenklatura were embedded within personnel and organisational structures.

S³awomir Majman drew a similar conclusion to Szczypiorski. I asked members of the EPP Group to study this opinion, as it could be important if the PO gained in strength. Majman wrote: “Poland quite simply has two left-wing electorates. One consists of those better-educated people who do not condemn the people’s democracy to the bitter end and who simultaneously recognise that a democratic Poland is more likely to offer them better opportunities. These left-wingers are in favour of a continued strict separation of church and state. They insist on the protection of minorities. In the social sector, they want lots of state activity but also privatisation. These left-wingers are in favour of the EU and have nothing against either present-day Russians or present-day Germans. They are also in favour of calm and factual discussions.”

Thus Majman. The (Polish!) left-wing electorate was constantly looking for a candidate who personified these values; however, there was no such candidate immediately after 2000, and so they kept a lookout for a lesser evil. These “centre-lefts”, as they could and should be called, had largely kept away from the ballot box until then. It was time for them wake up.

Let us consider the other left-wing electorate. This mainly comprises the supporters of populist and former Communist Party member Andrzej Lepper. They ended up on the left because the gleaming train of capitalism had left the station and was passing them by – or so they thought. As a result, they felt they were being unfairly treated by the free market and Brussels, and that liberals were “weakening the state”.

When Lepper scored a high with his left-wing politics, the agitprop genius Jaros³aw Kaczyñski attracted 80% of Lepper voters into his camp, and these went on to elect his brother president in the final round. There had been a whole crate full of left-wing agendas on the stage since spring 2005: more government spending on public services, cheap fuel for farmers, lots of money for families, an increase in unemployment benefit, even more protection against wrongful dismissal, millions for the shipyards.

Lepper-style left-wingers, I call them green National Socialists, were in the end the ones that benefited from the PiS’ nationalistic Catholic course.

Gone was the time when Aleksander Kwaœniewski nudged the left elegantly into the centre and then into the EU. This left the more solid leftwingers, who had chosen and elected Tusk, feeling as frustrated as those 141

Americans who had voted for Al Gore when George W. Bush won the 2000 US presidential election.

Although the twins had a lot of power, they knew the wind could change at any moment, and so we experienced a president who was hard and threatening, stuck behind his desk, a flatterer with no real respect for the constitution. Western newspapers talked increasingly of a Polish “move towards the right”. It is a case of being so busy staring into your rear view mirror that you crash into a lamppost.

Postscript 2 “Suggestions for a better Christian Democratic strategy in Poland” The text was prepared for MEP Elmar Brok and other EPP delegates:

It is becoming increasingly necessary to pay close attention to the concepts being used to analyse the situation in Poland. We must at least recognise that we have seen developments like those taking place in Poland before. Even Jaspers described the Hitler movement as being “from left to right”. And it cannot be a coincidence that dictators like Pi³sudski and Mussolini once came from socialist parties.

We in the EPP will make ourselves more credible if we at last recognise our mistakes and inform our Polish friends about this. Our support for the PC after 1990 might have been partially right at the time, but in the end it was wrong and damaging. When we turned the horse around in order to ride in the direction of the “Freedom Union”, we were better able to analyse, although we acted much too slowly, at least with regard to EU development. And that again was a fundamental mistake.

We knew that the UW electorate was small and inflexible, as was the potential offered by the UW, in particular because some of its groups were not active at grass-roots level. A few proven “friends of the people” like Tadeusz Mazowiecki, or top journalists like Adam Michnik, were not enough, and in the countryside in particular, neither the UW nor the PC had solid support. Unfortunately, I persevered with the PC plan for a long time, and had to publicly endure a justified Philippika von Mazowiecki at the Marriott Hotel in Warsaw at the time of President Rita Süssmuth’s visit from Bonn. It was painful to have to disappoint such good friends, but in the end, even I could see that JK had brought about a lot of political damage. I therefore told everyone in Brussels, from the top to the bottom, what I now thought about “talks” with PiS, and about the non-political opinion that we should in future try to work “things” out with low-level rather than high-level PiS officials.

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Even competent Catholic Dutchman Wim van Velzen (C.D.A.) made mistakes, because he usually had to limit himself to talks in Warsaw because of a lack of time. He too believed it was possible to “fish in the lower ranks of PiS in order to avoid JK”. Everyone who held this opinion was mistaken.

In the early phase of 1990–2005, we were all victims of a “shifting sand dune”, as Szczypiorski put it. A quantum of opposition folk – most of them from Solidarity, many associated with the Church, others just affiliated to their businesses – joined together after the fall of communism to form the first real party, the PC. In the first completely free elections, it received just 9% of the vote. Then the sand dune shifted, renamed itself “AWS” – a “collection” with lots of Solidarity ballast – and failed again.

Although Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek stayed in office for a full term, the only prime minister of the 3rd Republic of Poland to have done so, parties and plans were flying around all over the place in the Sejm.

After the AWS foundered, part of the dune shifted again, and this time PO was formed. Although made up of new, previously inactive people, it was immediately successful. Why was this? One reason was that, before setting the party up, its architects organised open debate forums in major Polish towns and cities, where people could really voice their opinions about both Warsaw and local scandals. This was the first time there had been a party composed largely of new members. At the time, I found out about the plans for the new party in the usual way: a young entrepreneur, a former participant on the Robert Schuman Foundation stagiaire programme, told me about rounds of talks held by new members of the middle classes such as doctors, lawyers, architects, and bank managers.

It was out of their anger, and a decision to start afresh without pushing all politicians to one side, that PO came into being.

If the EPP believes that Poland is one of the most important partners in Europe, it must change the way it behaves, even daring to start afresh.

Possible courses of action include: y Immediately begin extending regular invitations to PO. Strengthen it on all levels by holding thorough planning discussions with PO members. Cover the provinces. Insist on participation by existing EPP friends too, not necessarily put forward by PO. Case in point: our Polish former Schuman Foundation stagiaires were pushed aside by many senior PO politicians, but these people are knowledgeable and capable; y Focus on organisational development and propose regional conferences to help with this; y Invite PO to take part even now in EPP missions in Europe and the rest of the world, particularly in the Ukraine, the Baltics and the USA; y Make it clear that we think the Ukraine should be given the status of a “privileged partner of the EU”, as should Belarus, if it becomes democratic; 143

y The EPP and the Foundation could suggest founding a “Working Group for Christian Values� within PO, the reason being that many excellent Christian Democrats feel they are currently being ignored by PO. There are after all plenty of Christian Democrat groups in Poland.

(Note: PO was also encouraged to do this by the Robert Schuman Foundation in Luxembourg. Unfortunately it never responded.)

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In a minefield: Catholic versus “Catholic” groups Even before the establishment of Solidarity in the summer of 1980, Western Catholic Christian Democrats had discovered a political phenomenon in Poland that was unique in Europe, namely the simultaneous and successive coexistence of extremely politically active Catholic groupings, but without card-carrying party members. Whilst similar groups in other communist countries like Hungary, Czechoslovakia and particularly the GDR were only active in association with the ruling party (National Front), together with which they saw their “main job as being to develop socialism”, in Poland there was a balanced relationship between the Catholic groups and the communists, which allowed for some opposition, albeit within narrow limits.

Nowadays, after publication of some Soviet and Polish documents, but also thanks to Western news services, we know that some of the “Catholic” operations in Poland were under outside influence. Alignment with Soviet ideas and plans was always involved, but also some distinctions between Moscow and Warsaw. It all began because Moscow reluctantly tolerated the Church policy pursued by Polish comrades after 1956, although not without exerting influence on the political realisation of this policy.

This set of circumstances continued until the mid-1960s, when it became increasingly complicated, at least for Western analysts. Catholic groups began to pull the rug from under each other’s feet, to link up with various wings of the ruling Communist Party in Warsaw, and to court the favour of clerics beneath the level of the bishops’ conference if the primate rejected them. Such cliques did not have any real success.

Around this time, one of the groups in particular began to infiltrate western and southern Europe. When Christian party politicians met members of the group, they could not help but query their business, and wonder who was behind the Polish visitors. It is therefore worth considering the history of these groupings, some of which disappeared completely after 1989, which says a lot about their transitory “significance”.

The regime in Warsaw had begun to allow Catholic groups even in Stalinist times. As I have already mentioned, the PAX association came about with the discreet support of Soviet comrades. This did not have any real political consequences. The church banned its clerics from joining PAX, and very few of them disobeyed. PAX was given carte blanche to publish a newspaper and to take over the lion’s share of the production and sale of devotional objects. From the very beginning, PAX delegates were involved in the work of the World Peace Council, which was driven

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by Moscow and based in Helsinki. Between 1968 and 1990, PAX was involved in every international “front organisation”. The money came from the World Peace Council network, either directly or via pseudo-donors.

In addition to the PAX, the Polish regime also permitted a charity organisation sympathetic to the government, as well as the ChSS Christian Social Association. The latter became involved in the “peace work” planned

by Moscow, particularly through cooperation with like-minded people in Prague, Budapest and East Berlin. This saw Catholics working alongside “progressive” Protestants.

1956 brought about fundamental change. In the course of de-Stalinisation, the Polish regime authorised five Clubs of Catholic Intelligentsia (“KIKs”). Those involved had hoped for four times as many. The intellectual leadership of the KIKs was soon concentrated in Kraków and Warsaw. The primate of Poland saw the clubs as part of a new, positive arrangement, which also included the removal of the ban on the weekly newspaper Tygodnik Powszechny in Kraków. Even today, this newspaper is still regarded as a small yet influential flagship of critical democratic Catholics. Pope John Paul II was associated with this newspaper while he was still Diocesan bishop Karol Wojty³a.

The climax of the “new line” was the admission of independent Catholics, known as the ZNAK party, to the Sejm. It was soon understood that, unlike PAX, “ZNAK” (meaning “sign” or “symbol”) was “not an export article”, but rather the symbol of a group that was benefiting from the establishment of a publishing house of the same name, and identified itself with the Warsaw-based magazine “Wi꟔ (bond). ZNAK was also given the opportunity to earn money with a company that was part of the “Libella” group, and this it put towards political and publishing activities.

The primate of Poland provided protection to the new network and never changed his mind about this, even though some Catholic politicians, whom I shall discuss below, later lied that they enjoyed the primate’s blessing as much as ZNAK. The outside world looked on in amazement as the ZNAK group achieved the unexpected: although it was “allocated” its seats in the Sejm after lengthy discussions with the ruling party, it did not have to fight too hard.

The communist officials usually accepted the candidates put forward by the ZNAK, although not always.

ZNAK was able to achieve some things on behalf of the Church and the wider body of believers in the Sejm; it even managed to effect some changes to the law. In certain cases, it abstained. No-one forced ZNAK to cooperate with the other Catholic groups already present in the Sejm, such as PAX and ChSS. Until 1965, ZNAK was primarily involved with domestic politics. Then began a period of correspondence between Polish and German bishops.

This was also an interim assessment of the first politically-relevant Church 146

contacts between Polish ZNAK representatives and the Central Committee of German Catholics. This phase had begun back in 1958, when Stanis³aw Stomma visited Bonn. The Polish communists were enraged by the correspondence, and their satellite groups PAX and ChSS also complained dutifully.

ZNAK strengthened its contacts with the Catholic peace movement Pax Christi in Germany whose secretary general Reinhold Lehmann was a brother of president-day cardinal Karl Lehmann. The Warsaw nomenklatura expressed surprise at ZNAK’s actions.

Then the Church and the security service SB also started to become angry. Even Soviet comrades started asking why ZNAK was allowed to have relationships with German Catholics among whom were any number of CDU/CSU opponents of the “Oder-Neisse peace border”. Similar noises came from the GDR, which had been trying since 1964 to enable Christians loyal to the regime to become involved with the “peace struggle”, by setting up a regular Berlin Conference of European Catholics (BK).

Meanwhile, Christian Democrats in Western Europe, including Germany, did not notice at all when, in 1966, Janusz Zab³ocki (born 1926), a member of the Warsaw KIK, set up the Catholic Social ODiSS institute, following a reassessment of the situation in Europe. Even then, it was not particularly clear what Zab³ocki, who had visited Moscow twice, really wanted.

In 1968, there were anti-Jewish riots in Poland, helped along by the minister of the interior General Mieczys³aw Moczar. Catholic intellectuals protested in the KIKs and even in the Sejm. Again, Moscow reacted nervously. Most of the Jews still living in Poland left the country. ZNAK criticised the government, but PAX and ChSS looked the other way.

Soon after, ODiSS announced its views on foreign policy, and it leaked through that two members of the communist politburo – including Józef Czyrek – were not against the establishment of a Christian Democratic party in Poland, provided it had a similar orientation to the CDU in the GDR. As part of Soviet infiltration plans, the eastern CDU was involved with the World Peace Council through the Berlin Conference, and used to send representatives to national “peace councils”.

In 1972, ZNAK representatives Stomma, Mazowiecki and Kisielewski held a six-hour debate on the “problems of cooperating with the Berlin Conference” in the Club of Catholic Intelligentsia in Warsaw. Until then, loyal ZNAK man Andrzej Micewski had worked as a Polish observer in the GDR capital, at the request of the Warsaw KIK, but he now resigned his position, referring to “the worst kind of remote control”. He was succeeded by the acquiescent Dr Zygmunt Drozdek, who lacked proper support within the KIK, apart from a minority around Janusz Zab³ocki. Drozdek (who was born in 1929) justified his cooperation with the BK and other projects in 2009, saying, amongst other things, that this was “the only 147

way” to get information out of Catholic Lithuania and to be able to maintain contacts. One of his contacts in Lithuania was Professor Viktoras Butkus, head of the seminary in Kaunas, a man who was understood in the Vatican to be open to blackmail.

Zab³ocki and Drozdek received conZdK president 1973: siderable support from the ruling party Dr Bernhard Vogel after the institute was founded. They were allocated large quantities of paper for newspapers and documents, which showed that it was a national concept, in sharp contrast to ZNAK. Two groups from within the Communist Party both called for the ZNAK groups to be dissolved, and for the compromise of 1956 to be restricted in its application to Janusz Zab³ocki.

At first Moscow refused: they wanted to take things step by step!

What particularly annoyed the nomenklatura was the fact that relations continued between the Germans and the ZNAK delegates in the Sejm, led by Professor Stomma, and what is more that these relations received positive comments. Both sides made an effort to hold conciliatory talks and seminars, in spite of the disputed “Oder-Neisse stumbling block”. ZNAK member Zab³ocki remained on the sidelines at first, then he ceased to attend the meetings. He and his backers were planning their own offensive.

At the end of September 1973, a political event occurred that cast its shadow until 1988, when the EPP established its first Polish contacts. Two meetings were held in Warsaw at nearly the same time, one a meeting of the first official delegation of the Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK), and the other a meeting of a group of Western European Christian Democrats invited by Zab³ocki, including a few German CDU members.

At the time, it was suspected that the seminar with the West European “Christian” group in the Arkadia-Nieborów palace had been arranged by the party and Zab³ocki alone, and this was later proven to be the case.

The SB secret service, which was present, documented the proceedings from beginning to end; nothing was left to chance. Talks about international détente (at NATO’s expense) helped hide the fact from Zab³ocki’s friends that Poland’s real opposition was becoming stronger from one year to the next. This was true of both the left-wing KOR (Workers’ Defence Committee) and fairly middle-class student circles.

What had happened? Bonn had known about both the Warsaw dates since June 1973, but the ZdK had not been fully informed about the ODiSS plans, even though there were CDU politicians involved on “both sides”.

Plans had been made for ZdK President Dr Bernhard Vogel (a member of the CDU leadership!) to be present in Nieborów, but he wanted to be 148

a “CDU observer” at most. On the other hand, the ZdK delegation was led

by ZdK Vice President Dr Albrecht Beckel, who as it happened was also on the CDU leadership team.

Vogel reacted to the scandal at the last minute by staying away. Later on, we found out through Polish friends that some of those present at Nieborów had been agitating against ZNAK. Attendees had also claimed, falsely, that Zab³ocki and ODiSS had the primate’s blessing; this lie was elaborated even further later on. I learned the truth straight away from a bishop: “The primate gratefully acknowledges that ODiSS is providing publishing services to help us disseminate the teachings of the council; however, politically speaking, only Professor Stomma and ZNAK still have his full confidence.” The primate confirmed this to me personally when I interviewed him shortly after.

In September 1973, neither the ZdK nor I had any idea of Zab³ocki’s further plans. Annual meetings under the slogan “Dialogue and Cooperation” were initiated, and had non-German partners in the EPP Group in Brussels, like the Belgian A. De Brouwer, whose political naivety seemed to increase with every plan. When in particular EPP delegates from the Netherlands, Belgium and Italy began to fall for Zab³ocki’s campaigns, the EPP leadership and the EPP Group finally agreed to the proposal made by Zab³ocki-sceptics to subject all future statements and objectives uttered by the ZNAK opposition group to a thorough examination. Vice President Siegbert Alber (CDU) of Stuttgart was also involved in this.

In 1975, ODiSS held its second seminar, this time in Brussels, which was attended for the first time by important international Christian Democratic officials from Rome. Polish emigrant and Brussels resident M. B. Lachowski attended for the second time. Today, we know that Lachowski was under the direction of the Polish Embassy in Brussels and worked with the secret service. He was ordered by Warsaw to organise contacts with Christian trade unions, some members of which were active in the BK. Meetings were held in Poland and the West alternately.

Only German and Dutch political representatives seemed to feel that Zab³ocki was playing EPP circles off against the ZNAK groups. The effects were weak because “peace activists” from Benelux had been coming to BK conferences in East Berlin for a long time, and they did not put up with any anti-communist questions.

Polish exile Konrad Sieniewicz was present at every meeting and other ODiSS events. Today, we know that he was a key figure in the Zab³ocki/ ODiSS project long before 1973, and that he had conspiratorial meetings with partners in Warsaw. This did not cause much alarm because Sieniewicz had good friends in Washington too. But who was Konrad Sieniewicz?

He was born in St Petersburg in Russia on 19 February 1912 and died in Warsaw in 1997. A lawyer for many years, he went into exile with the leadership of the Polish Labour Party after the war. He tried to muster 149

friends from Central Eastern Europe in New York, London and Paris. On his advice and that of Hungarian exiles, the Christian Democratic International (CDI) founded the Christian Democratic World Union (UMDC), an association of Christian Democrats from (Eastern) Central Europe. As was perfectly normal for exiles at the time, Sieniewicz worked with the CIA and other organisations funded by the US government. The UMDC did not have many members and only a handful of young people. The latter, which included the Hungarian György von O’sváth and Konrad Sieniewicz, UMDC the Pole Stanis³aw Gebhardt, travelled as far as East Asia speaking out against global communism. O’sváth, now living in Budapest again, said “we had no shortage of money”. Around the time that Zab³ocki founded the ODiSS, it occurred to the Hungarian and a few of his UMDC friends that he and his Baltic friends were sticking with anti-communist campaigns, while the Poles and the Czechs were gradually focussing on “coexistence” experiments. This tendency had increased since the Cuba crisis.

After representing the UMDC at the UN, and carrying out other activities, Sieniewicz finally ended up at a CDI office in Rome. He was made an “honorary member of the CDI”, and remained the UMDC’s Poland advocate. He was also a permanent guest at the EUCD, and had access to nearly all proceedings within the network of Christian Democratic parties.

In the early 1970s, his activities came to the attention of Italian counterintelligence, and also became known in Bonn and Brussels in the context of the exchange of information between NATO countries.

S. lied, for example, in register entries, stating that he had been born “in Poland” and had a French passport. In reality, he was stateless, and never held a French passport. After his first visit to his Polish homeland, he received a special Polish travelling document. In Warsaw, witnesses began to notice in 1972 that Sieniewicz received preferential treatment from airport officials, and did not have to pass through luggage checks.

This even remained the case after 1981, when martial law was imposed.

Siegbert Alber remembers: “The Sieniewicz case really was striking. The rulers in Warsaw wouldn’t allow prominent Polish emigrants into the country, but I saw how they looked after Sieniewicz.”

The private side of this friend of Zab³ocki’s was also fascinating. He met Wac³awa Kowalska from Sosnowiec, who was 33 years his junior, in Upper Silesia, and married her quickly in Rome. After considerable wrangling, the marriage took place in the Vatican, not in a Roman registry office. This was because Sieniewicz did not want his wife’s papers – apart from her passport – presented in the Republic of Italy. The reason for this 150

was not made known. On the other hand, it was revealed that the nomenklatura promised him he could be buried in Poland.

Today there can be no doubt that this fortunate individual had a foot in both camps; however, he did not cause any serious damage to anyone.

He also became a screen onto which Western politicians could project their not infrequent naivety during the Cold War. Unfortunately, this only served to demonstrate that Christian Democrats were also taken in by the communist opponent.

In November 1987, one year before Egon Klepsch’s first visit to Poland, a CDI delegation led by Flaminio Piccoli travelled to Warsaw, in a trip planned by Konrad Sieniewicz and other officials. Fortunately, Angelo Bernassola and Thomas Jansen had their feet in various doors in Rome, so they were able to learn something about the visit.

The Polish leadership, which was still sticking with martial law and a ban on any opposition, brought all its prominence to bear to try to impress Piccoli. The visitors even met with W³adys³aw Si³aNowicki, the still “illegal” leader of the former Labour Party, in Warsaw, along with ZNAK group oppositionists (without their chiefs!). The del- CDI President Flaminio Piccoli: egation was allowed to visit the Illusions about Poland grave of the murdered priest Popie³uszko, while the dictator Jaruzelski received Piccoli and praised Gorbachev’s new line. The corrupt Sejm marshal Malinowski (ZSL) behaved as if his agrarian party was moving towards Christian Democracy.

A member of the delegation learnt that the church still firmly supported the opposition and was not a fan of the latest tinkering around with the Zab³ocki project.

This was because, in the years after 1975, many things did not go to plan for ODiSS. In the battle to amend the constitution to increase Poland’s already humiliating ties to the Kremlin, Stanis³aw Stomma was the only ZNAK representative to abstain, for which he received international approval, with the help of the media. This was followed by the communists’ secret plan to liquidate ZNAK bit by bit. Like Mazowiecki before him, Stomma was forced to leave the Sejm, in an intentional provocation directed at the Church. Nearly all ZNAK representatives who approved the amendment were rewarded with positions, and one even received a seat on the Polish Council of State.

Soon after Stomma’s brave act, the Zab³ocki group usurped the ZNAK brand name and began to spread lies about what it was doing, both in Rome and amongst the EUCD parties. Only this time it had made a mis151

take. In January 1977, a group of well-known French Christian Democrats led by Pierre Bordry (CDS) protested against the “rape” of the ZNAK, and threatened to pull out of ODiSS’ “dialogue” seminars. From this point on, the number of Western observers steadily decreased, EUCD bodies paid attention to Polish manoeuvres, and Zab³ocki’s communist partners advised their useful ally to make a “fresh start”.

This was particularly necessary because, with the founding of Solidarity in summer 1980, it became clear who the real Polish opposition leaders were, namely Solidarity advisors like Mazowiecki and Geremek, and practically no-one from the Zab³ocki camp. On the contrary, this camp was issuing warnings of a “violent lurch towards Trotskyism among the opposition”, and attempting to deter scared bishops from lending their support to Lech Wa³êsa. Nevertheless, people like Zygmunt Drozdek tried to negotiate between the fronts, having come to understand that, among others, 90% of the Warsaw KIK and the majority of all other KIKs supported the strike movement and rejected the “reformed communists”.

On 14 April 1981, six months before martial law was declared, Zab³ocki and Marek £êtowski wrote to Brussels on behalf of the “dialogue” organisers to announce that they had changed the name of their parliamentary group from ZNAK to “PZKS”, which stood for “Polish Catholic Social Union”. Yet again they lied, this time that they had the Church on their side and a spiritual advisor in the form of the £AD newspaper. They could not deceive Western experts in this way: the “advisor” was only responsible for the theological and Christian cultural part of the newspaper. Unfortunately, some Brussels officials still failed to understand this, although the reaction of Leo Tindemans and Egon Klepsch was unmistakeable.

Unfortunately, in February 1989, the PZKS group was still able to visit Strasbourg, led by Sejm member and SB informer Wies³aw Gwizdz. They had more or less invited themselves to the Parliament. At the last moment, Egon Klepsch confirmed that the EPP Group would keep its distance, and that it was in no way involved with any plans to set up a “Christian” party in Poland. It thus became clear in Rome that the whole Zab³ocki operation had failed.

On 13 December 1981, the communists smothered the young Polish democracy, and we were soon wondering how Sieniewicz and his comrades would deal with the development. Initially things were quiet, but Sieniewicz was seen going into the Polish embassy in Rome. It was not until spring 1987 that we had a clearer picture. Poland was moving towards the Round Table Talks. None of the groups linked to the regime were involved, although Zab³ocki and Drozdek would have liked this.

As it was, all the leading opposition activists, including Mazowiecki, met with friends from Vienna, Paris, Budapest, Dresden(!) and Bonn in Kraków in spring 1989. They were already discussing the “future of Central Europe”. They were quite optimistic that communism was coming to 152

an end, and were in favour – with some exceptions – of a reunified Germany in the context of a new order and “final détente” in Europe. None of the collaborators were invited to Kraków to observe the talks.

The frustrated Zab³ocki had ventured to set up a “Christian Democratic Club” in September 1988, albeit as a “department” of an institute aimed at “deepening religious belief”. The authorities registered Zab³ocki’s new club on 20 September 1988, on the instructions of Church officials. Hardly anything happened. After the fall of communism, it became clear to me as a German what had taken place in Warsaw: the secret services were planning ways of surviving with political Christians. The first CDU chairman in the GDR after the fall of communism was a member of the Stasi!

Only Sieniewicz began from scratch. He focussed on re-establishing the “Labour Party”, because he had been advised to do so by Rakowski and other comrades. In summer 1989, he propagated the lie that the Church was committed to the old/new party. What is true is that the Polish Pope personally warned against such a move, and Primate Glemp was also not in favour of it.

Sieniewicz did not give up. On 9 March 1989, he wrote to the Secretary General of the EUCD/EPP in Brussels, Thomas Jansen, from Rome on Centrist Democrat International-headed paper to ask him for $600,000 to help develop the Labour Party in Poland. He made all kinds of requests, for items ranging from office equipment to pamphlets, but they went unanswered. Around the same time, the EUCD and the EPP encouraged Sieniewicz and his people, of whom there were not many, in unambiguous terms to cooperate in establishing a large centre party in Poland, and to give up claims of sole representation. When the party nevertheless tried to join the EPP, it was refused straight away.

In 1988/89, it gradually became clear that several of Zab³ocki’s people had worked with the secret service. One of these people was Wac³aw Auleytner, one-time secretary of the KIK in Warsaw, and another was the journalist Myslnik, who worked at Tygodnik Powszechny until he caused a serious road accident and left Kraków. The SB saw to it that the judiciary “forgot about” Myslnik, and made him a delegate of the pseudo-ZNAK group, which at the time – apart from Stomma – comprised just ODiSS people. Stomma himself was forced to leave by the communists.

Father Andrew F. Morlion O.P., president of Università Pro Deo on Viale Pola in Rome, told me on 8 July 1976 that as far as he was concerned, Sieniewicz was a double agent. This opinion was shared by Prelate Stanislaus Tulaba, the head of St. Casimir’s Lithuanian College in Rome.

Both friends were aware of Polish spies in Rome, e.g. the journalist Ignacy Krasicki, who, in 1965, was able to pass a copy of a letter sent by the Polish bishops to their German brothers to the SB in Warsaw (with whose help?) before the original letter even reached its destination in Germany.

There are plenty more cases of lesser significance.

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For the purpose of this book and its subject, all that matters is that Sieniewicz was heavily, permanently and successfully involved in relations between the Zab³ocki group and the Western European Christian Democrats. In 1975, Sieniewicz wrote Le Parti Chrétien du Travail polonais (The Polish Christian Labour Party), the 20th book in a series published by the Rome-based Christian Democratic information centre Centre international démocrate-chrétien d’information et de documentation. This libellous book paints the ZNAK group, and Tadeusz Mazowiecki in particular, as unchristian left-wingers and pro-Marxists, whilst simultaneously praising Zab³ocki and the ODiSS. Even worse, on page 50 Sieniewicz suggests that the Polish government has promised a new Christian representation, without specifying whether this could mean a party. The German and other Christian Democrats who had close ties to Prof. Stomma and ZNAK could do nothing initially other than growl in meetings. There were good reasons not to reveal everything one knew in Rome.

Prior to the founding of the centre party in Warsaw in spring 1991, a few people in Poznañ made a well-intentioned attempt to unite Christian mini parties. As a result, even servants of the system like PAX and PZKS met up with solid Christian Democrats. This was partly because PAX collaborators had promised that large sums of money would be available if the parties could join together. However, the “Poznañ” project failed.

It was to be the last attempt of the ambitious Zab³ocki.

Postscript Was JZ an agent? He was certainly not on the communist payroll. He was a classic example of an agent of influence. He never asked for exact details of who was paying for which seminars, or who received tickets for free.

And Sieniewicz? US experts told me it was a mistake to “stop paying Sieniewicz for anti-communist activities overnight”, thereby influencing his existence in Rome. I have reason to believe that Sieniewicz allowed himself to be helped by the Polish nomenklatura in good faith. Some comrades on this side were critical of the Soviets, others seemed to think a Polish Christian party would help bring about peace in the country.

Now as then, there is no reason to run down the above-mentioned opponents of our course. They nevertheless became opponents because some of them were taken in by Kremlin strategies at a time when it was not clear whether the communist system could survive. A cardinal friend of mine told me: “I’m sure they thought they were patriots, but they got too many things completely wrong.” They could not yet know about the bridges being built between the EPP and the Polish political centre. Yet imagination won out, particularly when it was combined with courage.

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Activity of EPP associations The EPP includes several groups that deal with specific problems in society or that are linked to traditional associations with specific interests. I am going to mention just three here: the European Union of Christian Democratic Workers (EUCDA) and the women’s association EPP Women, both of Norbert Blüm which reached out to friends in Poland before and and Lech after 1980, particularly within the Church, and the Youth of the European People’s Party, which was involved in admirable relief campaigns on behalf of Poland during the period of martial law.

EPP Women presidency

EUCDA President Elmar Brok, predecessor Jean-Claude Juncker

Ice-cold in Tadeusz Mazowiecki’s office I have never before spoken publicly about the essence of my very first conversation with Tadeusz Mazowiecki. We met in his office in the KIK in Warsaw on a freezing night in January 1971. We still addressed each other formally, having just met that night at a dinner given by Polish Foreign Minister Stefan Jêdrychowski in honour of German CDU politician Rainer Barzel. Mazowiecki was by then a “former Sejm member”.

He had yet to embark upon his fruitful trips to Germany.

The private discussion washed down with lots of tea began with Mazowiecki describing the “Gdañsk events” of December 1970, just two weeks earlier, when workers at the Lenin shipyard in Gdañsk had gone on strike to protest against extortionate prices and rotten wages.

The army, led by General Wojciech Jaruzelski (sic!) amongst others, fired into the demonstrators on the orders of the communists, resulting in many deaths on the streets of Gdañsk. The Andrzej Wajda film Man of Marble (1977) captured the protests on film. Unfortunately, it was not widely shown in Western Europe.

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Mazowiecki had been present in Gdañsk to show his support for the workers and offer advice, and when we met in Warsaw he had only been back for a few days. I asked him, “What’s the way forward after such violence? Do you have a solution?”, in response to which he said something astonishing, given it was ten years before the founding of Solidarity: “We (he said we) mustn’t go out onto the streets again and demonstrate next time. We must instead barricade ourselves inside the factories.” Is that all? “No.” There followed a second revelation, “We must try to set up a trade union.” A trade union?

“Why not?”

Mazowiecki did not want to go into details; there was still “a lot of thinking to be done”. He was clearly in favour of choosing a concept and then a course of action that the regime could not attack head-on.

Later, Pope John Paul II added the concept of solidarity to the early deliberations in Warsaw. Although the concept “only” came from the Church’s code of social ethics, it was the perfect slogan for Poland. And the Holy Father added, “don’t be afraid!”

In the summer of 1980, Gdañsk was once again rocked by strikes.

The people barricaded themselves into the factories. In 1980/1981, the independent trade union grew into an 11-million-strong opposition movement. At times, almost one in five members of Poland’s Communist Party, including leading officials, was also part of this new popular movement in Gdañsk.

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Europe’s Social Democrats before 1989 – the cold shoulder for Poland Immediately after the Kremlin-controlled GDR built the Berlin Wall, the first left-wing youth associations in Germany began to discuss contacts with the state-controlled youth organisations in Eastern Europe. The “Falcons”, a youth organisation with links to the SPD, was the first German group to travel to Poland. The initiative came from Kalli Prall, a former Falcon from SPD-controlled Hesse.

When the group came back, the Falcon newspaper contained the following report: “It was awful in Poland. On Sundays, there were more Catholics running to the overflowing churches than in the Adenauer state.”

In meetings, they complained they had scarcely met any like-minded people: “Even the comrades’ children go to church over there.”

Then, in 1976, Walter Lorang of Pax Christi in Frankfurt told Bonn, “The Catholic youth organisation in Poland has been banned from taking part in a youth exchange programme with the Federal Republic. This is intolerable.”

A thing of the past? Undoubtedly, but Social Democratic parties still recalled such events when, after the strikes of 1980 and the founding of Solidarity, people began to talk about solidarity with Poland and the provision of aid.

Willy Brandt, who was leader of the Socialist International, held comrades back from becoming involved in Poland, claiming they were being “too rash”. Austria’s SPÖ chief Bruno Kreisky polemicised against the Polish church: “It is jointly responsible for the country’s economic plight.” Belgian socialists told their Polish comrades, “don’t demand anything that will make Moscow afraid”.

The picture was inconsistent, as is so often the case. French socialist trade unionists provided Warsaw with modern office equipment and printing paper. Sweden was also quick to offer material help, as well as setting up hidden communications between Gdañsk and Stockholm.

In the German trade union federation DGB, long-standing friends of Poland argued with Social Democrats, who were afraid of “too much desire for freedom in Warsaw”. The chance presence of a Warsaw delegation in Bremen on 13 December 1981 (beginning of martial law) led to the creation of a local office that supported the freedom movement. Bremen’s SPD mayor Hans Koschnick, who was married to a devout woman, stood up to comrades on the SPD executive who were considered, not without reason, a “Moscow party”, in particular Egon Bahr. Koschnick remained a loyal friend of Poland even after the country became democratic.

Unfortunately, Koschnick represented a minority. A vote held in the European Parliament in 1985 showed that an anti-Warsaw atmosphere pre157

vailed in the European Community too: left-wingers, including the Socialists, rejected a call for aid for Poland made by the Christian Democrats.

In December 1985, there was an embarrassing scene in Warsaw. The communists had invited Willy Brandt and the SPD executive to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the Polish-German Treaty of Warsaw. The Germans were prepared to blank Lech Wa³êsa, and later lied that they had not been able to arrange a meeting with him. Instead they met Tadeusz Mazowiecki in the German embassy, in an encounter described by a friend as “icy”.

On the evening of the same day, the communists gave a reception for Brandt in Jab³onna Palace in Warsaw. The whole episcopate avoided the reception. There was also a press conference for German journalists led by the then party spokesman Wolfgang Clement. The party was represented by Hans Koschnick, who was quite drunk after the reception in the embassy. He was also visibly depressed and after three sentences had tears in his eyes. He described the poverty of the Polish people, who were at the time suffering greatly from a lack of supplies. Poland’s fate weighed heavy on him, he said. Then something happened that I would never forget: Egon Bahr, who was sitting behind me amongst the journalists, said, quite audibly to those around him, “who cares about Poland – it’s the Soviet Union that matters to us”. We all knew that that was what he thought, but nobody expected him to voice his opinion so thoughtlessly in Poland.

The Polish exiles had been without any illusions for some time. Delegates at a meeting of exiled Polish Social Democrats in Cologne in November 1982 discovered that Brandt’s Socialist International (SI) was in contact with the Jaruzelski dictatorship, and had condemned “left-wing opposition” to the regime. What was meant was the Workers’ Defence Committee.

When Wa³êsa advisor Mazowiecki visited Vienna and met Christian trade unionists who wanted to help, he also saw Fritz Verzetnitsch (SPÖ), head of the Austrian Trade Union Federation ÖGB. Saddened, the Pole listened as he was told that “people” only wanted relations with officially recognised unions. In 1989, when Poland became a democracy, the opportunist Verzetnitsch withdrew his condemnation and sent the delegate Gabrielle Traxler to Vienna airport with flowers. A Solidarity delegation was expected.

One would imagine that such a seasoned SPD Chancellor as Helmut Schmidt, who never drank champagne with communists in private, would have a different opinion to Bahr. Most likely, if not definitely. Nevertheless, he irritated the Polish opposition. Firstly, he continued with his visit to the GDR on 13 December 1981 despite the suppression of the Polish opposition; secondly, he had previously already expressed the opinion that he could well imagine as capable a man as Edward Gierek as a member 158

of his government. Thirdly, he was afraid of “Polish cockiness” with regard to Moscow.

German friends of Poland were particularly embarrassed by the fact that many SPD comrades were too keen to agree to the Polish speech conventions. For example, the Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Bonn, which has links to the SPD, is credited with having helped save the German Jewish cemetery in Wroc³aw. When, however, the Polish leader of the project in Bonn made a further application for aid, and began his letter to his comrades with “Breslau” (German for Wroc³aw) at the top, he was asked instead to write “Wroc³aw”. This made the Poles fall about laughing when they received the letter.

PS – At the end of the Brandt visit in December 1985 mentioned above, there was a communiqué in Bonn. It said that the SPD chief’s talks with military dictator Wojciech Jaruzelski had taken place in “a very open and friendly atmosphere”. This was less than a year after the murder of the priest Jerzy Popie³uszko.

To the dismay not only of the Polish opposition, but also of many socialists in the West, the SPD and the Polish United Workers’ Party (PZPR) set up a joint commission at the end of the Brandt visit aimed at maintaining peace. Four years later, after the fall of communism, the commission died an early death. Only Warsaw visitor Egon Bahr retained his worldview.

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History of the European People’s Party and its predecessors Any politically-minded European Christian wanting to join a party in the second half of the 19th century would have struggled at first to find one that defined itself explicitly as Christian. Nevertheless, there were various other options open to such citizens in continental Europe from Belgium to Poland and from Italy to Germany. The only groups and parties that could not be considered in principle were those that were militantly critical of Christianity and that fought the Catholic Church in particular, for whatever reason.

By the 1870s, the political landscape had changed fundamentally. Parties of politically-committed Christians, predominantly Catholics, sprang up at around the same time, in general to gird themselves against atheist, Marxist early socialism, but also against liberalist politicians, who would have liked to “lock all churches in the vestries”, and also against national conservative forces such as factory owners and big landowners, who were resisting solutions to the social problems arising in industrial society.

“Parties of Christian inspiration”, as we have called them since 1945, were composed at the time almost exclusively of Catholics, even though this might not always have been obvious from their names. Let us take France in particular as an example.

Amazingly, Europe’s first Christian party, “Parti Catholique”, was formed immediately after the French Revolution of February 1848. What is even more incredible is that this Catholic party put forward republican arguments. It is hard to believe nowadays, but at the turn of the last century but one, the Catholic parties were not interested in cooperating with their foreign counterparts. The reasons for this are to be found in the political situation at the time: a strongly socialist part of the labour movement distanced itself from nationalism and began to establish an ideology-based proletarian internationalism. Catholic parties distanced themselves from this kind of dynamic, but this did not stop left- and right-wingers from classifying them as “papist proletarian internationalists”, supposedly led discreetly by the Vatican.

It was not until 1924 that a stronger successor party to the Parti Catholique emerged in France, and this specifically avoided the term “Catholic”, calling itself instead the “Parti démocrate populaire” or Popular Democratic Party. Nevertheless, by choosing the term “popular party”, the founders were expressing something that continues to be the essence of a real Christian Democrat party today. Such parties want to appeal to all sections of society and not only the mostly material interests of a single social class. After the First World War, it also became evident that they

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were going to lengths to distance themselves from the various conservative parties of the 19th century.

Both before and after the First World War, the new Christian parties often had to defend the rights of the Catholic Church in their countries, primarily in the battle for Christian schools and resisting an over-hasty secularisation. At the same time, they tried to turn the church’s code of social ethics into concrete policies, to strengthen Christian trade unions, and to attenuate the class struggle. As a result, they were neither right- nor left-wing to begin with, but stood in the political centre. The “Deutsche Zentrumspartei” (German Centre Party) professed this position with its name.

Up until 1914, an increasing number of national conservatives, one might even say chauvinists, were setting the tone in society right across Europe. Even the Catholic parties of the time approved exaggerated national goals, from colonial policy to expensive armament and longed-for national border changes. Such a climate was not yet conducive to European cooperation between the “fathers of Christian democracy”, in so far as they existed at the time. It was not until the inferno of 1914/18, which today we call the “First European Civil War”, that new ways of thinking came about.

One of the most significant fathers of Christian democracy was the Sicilian Italian priest Don Luigi Sturzo (1871 – 1959). In 1919, Sturzo founded the “Partito Popolare Italiano” or Italian People’s Party (PPI), and immediately called for a platform for international cooperation between like-minded people. When he fled to England to escape the dictator Mussolini, he sounded out opinion in London in 1924 to find out what other parties thought about the project. As a result, a small committee travelled through Europe, declaring that people should oppose communist proletarian internationalism with “Christian force”. According to Sturzo, they could start by drawing support from the “International Federation of Christian Trade Unions”, which was founded in 1920.

Ultimately, Don Sturzo wanted the (still completely separate) parties to produce a joint political programme.

What many people forget today is that Sturzo and his party came “from the left”: for example, they sided with poor farmers fighting big landowners in southern Italy. At the time, more than 80% of the priests on the islands of Sicily and Sardinia came from the poorest social class. It is interesting to note that Poland’s early agrarian parties had priests like Don Sturzo as their spiritual leaders, and were also involved in the Polish uprisings.

The first international meeting of “delegates” from Christian parties and groups, long wished-for by Don Sturzo, was finally held in Paris in 1925. All the participants were delegated rather than elected. At the time, anyone who was interested attended the meeting.

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The following were represented in Paris: • • • •

France: “Parti Démocrate Populaire” (Popular Democratic Party, PDP); Germany: “Deutsche Zentrumspartei” (German Centre Party, Z); Italy: “Partito Populare Italiano” (Italian People’s Party, PPI); Belgium: “Ligue des Travailleurs Catholique de Belgique” (labour wing of the Belgian “Catholic Union”); • Poland: “Chrzeœcijañskiej Demokracji” (Christian Democracy) Invitations to parties in the Netherlands, Switzerland, Czechoslovakia, Lithuania and Spain went unanswered.

Seven years had passed since the war (1914–1918), but those gathered kept their heads down and avoided political commitments, not only out of consideration for national relations. Some negotiations were even carried out in secret, which meant that the media – which amounted to just newspapers at the time – was not able to find out anything at all. Don Sturzo was disappointed.

The few “delegates” were not only hindered by their differing national loyalties, they were also divided into two camps on the subject of a loose form of cooperation (which they simply called “exchange of information”). The French wanted nothing more than a small central information bureau, while the Italians, who were already fighting fascism, called for a “permanent interparliamentary union”.

Unfortunately, the French got their way. Although committees were set up to supervise the “bureau”, those involved made a binding agreement that no federation of parties should be formed “at the time”. The absolute independence of the individual parties and groups as far as programme and organisation were concerned was still considered to be of prime importance – and this prevented the representatives of the nations concerned from pooling their powers.

Another dispute which arose at the time still resonates today: after the meeting in Paris, some people wanted to call themselves “Christian Democratic”, while others – primarily the French – abruptly refused. This argument over direction must sound familiar to many of the politicians active in Central and Eastern Europe today, because similar arguments have been circulating since 1989.

It is worth remembering that, at the time, the Vatican was not yet in favour of democracy. Pope Pius XII was the first to express a cautious belief in popular government at Christmas 1944. Don Sturzo had already invented the concept “Christian Democratic” in America in 1942. This is further proof of his progressive and farsighted attitude.

The French thought differently. In 1925, they warned that the name “Christian Democratic” would be seen as “proof of the clerical nature of the (Catholic) parties”, which would seriously restrict their effectiveness.

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German and other powers, however, saw the description “Christian Democratic” as a clear renunciation of the proximity of Catholic parties in smaller countries to their respective national church hierarchies. In Germany, it was also a matter of the Centre party “extending a hand to Protestant Christians” (Adam Stegerwald). As early as 1871, Bishop von Keppler of Mainz had urged the “centre” to nominate Protestant as well as Catholic Christians to the Reichstag elections.

The fear of resembling the “Socialist International” within the political sphere had strange effects: the “bureau”, i.e. the “International Secretariat of Democratic Parties of Christian Inspiration” (SIPDIC), which was not only financially but also politically weak, only met behind closed doors (sic!), and refused to come up with any resolutions or theories (with the exception of the 1931 call for peace). Worse still, the “bureau” was unfortunately divided with regard to its assessment of the new right-wing extremism (National Socialists, fascists). The exiled Italian Christian Democrats wanted “anti-fascist” action; the French refused. As a result, the SIPDIC preferred to deal with “soft” themes of political Catholicism: social politics, family and profit-sharing for workers.

A few strategic aspects of the efforts at the time are significant, particularly against the background of the polemical theory that the model for European unification put forward by Jean Monnet, Robert Schuman and Konrad Adenauer in 1950/1951 was just (!) something “born of the Cold War” (Joseph Stalin), and therefore a conscious division of the continent.

Politicians from Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Germany had been working together in the SIPDIC for a long time before the Second World War broke out in 1939, and colleagues in Austria, Switzerland, Poland and Czechoslovakia had also expressed their sympathy.

Politicians from those six countries had therefore formed a cooperating “core” a full twenty years before the division of Europe, and this resurfaced in 1951 and 1957, when the foundations of today’s European Union were being laid. Stalin was lying. Unfortunately, a few leading German Social Democrats were also lying. German Chancellor Gerd Schröder acted as if no-one started “thinking about Europe” until the foundation of the “European Economic Community” in Rome in 1957. Why? Quite simply because the German SPD had voted against Konrad Adenauer’s European policy prior to 1957.

There were no more large SIPDIC conferences after 1933, and in 1939 the work petered out. Nevertheless, something happened that is quite astonishing in the light of today’s developments: Don Sturzo was able to found a small organisation called the International Christian Democratic Union together with a group of Britons of Christian Democratic-orientation and other exiled politicians. The very name of the organisation was forward-looking: the concept of “union” rather than “party” in particular was to play a big role after 1945. Don Sturzo himself was at the time 163

against parties defined by ideology, which was one reason why he was in favour of popular parties. These could better be described as “unions” rather than by the traditional term “parties”. Sturzo’s PPI (Italian People’s Party, founded in 1919) was the first European party to act on this consideration.

Because a few Christian Democrats continued to exchange information and maintain international contacts even in exile, talks regarding a new European cooperation were able to begin almost immediately after 1945.

Had they learnt from their own weakness in the period before 1939? It seemed so, at least to some extent. The Swiss “Konservative Volkspartei” (Conservative Popular Party) took the initiative. As a neutral state, Switzerland was the only country to have survived the war without considerable problems.

Initiatives on Swiss soil were therefore not unusual at the time.

In September 1946, for example, Winston Churchill chose Zurich as the place in which to deliver his legendary speech calling for “a kind of United States of Europe” (not THE United States of Europe). In the same month, the Swiss European movement hosted a meeting of European federalists that led to the development of the “Hertenstein Programme”, which is still relevant today. One of the participants was the far-sighted Pole Józef Retinger, London-based adviser to the prime minister of the Polish Government in Exile, General W³adys³aw Sikorski, during the war, until the latter’s death in 1943.

Between 27 February and 2 March 1946, Christian Democrats from eight countries met in Lucerne “as private individuals”. Czechs and Hungarians could not come because of political pressure, and Germans were not yet invited. Unfortunately, the pre-war dispute and basic organisational issues came up again. The Italians, the Swiss and the Austrians pressed for unified action. The Belgians, the French and the Dutch, on the other hand, objected, and their plan for a “loose cooperation” prevailed.

This did at least lead to the creation of the “Nouvelles Equipes Internationales”, a casual “alliance of new international groups” (NEI). This enigmatic name hid the (French) idea of unifying individuals rather parties, including individuals from Christian Democratic associations and trade unions. Once again, the French were afraid that any joint plans could look too clerical to the public. The name made no difference, since the left-wingers and liberals immediately called the NEI a “papal agency”.

Such misgivings were barely understood in Italy and Germany; after all, Don Sturzo had specifically demanded before the war that Christian Democratic parties in particular should be strictly independent of the church and the clergy, both financially and politically. After 1945, parties emerged in Austria and Germany in which Christians of different confessions worked together of their own accord. Attempts by older German Catholic priests 164

to revive the old “centre” quickly failed. Today, the CDU/CSU (D) and the ÖVP (A) parties include Muslims and people of no faith. As Adenauer said, “Why not, if they agree with our policies?”

The success of the NEI, which was the precursor of today’s EPP, is down to the fact that it brought together people who represented more than just their traditional parties. French participants included Robert Schuman, Georges Bidault, Henri Teitgen and André Colin. Germany’s Konrad Adenauer became involved at an early stage. Other collaborators included Alcide De Gasperi (Italy), Paul van Zeeland and Auguste E. De Schryver (Belgium), Josef Bech (Luxembourg), Felix Hurdes (Austria) and Emmanuel Sassen (the Netherlands). The list of “NEI fathers” was soon long and representative, in particular thanks to the sum of their personal successes in elections and, in particular, in their governments.

The NEI introduced a so-called “team principle”, which turned out to be advantageous. Thereby only one (national) “team” from each country could belong to the NEI, even when there were several eligible Christian parties, as for example in the Netherlands or among exiled Spanish Christian Democrats. This meant that, before the establishment of the current united Dutch CDA for example, a Catholic party had to unite with two Protestant parties to form a joint NEI team. Exiled Spanish politicians had to do the same, as did Christian and conservative parties from Hungary and Switzerland.

The EPP abolished the “team” regulation after the fall of communism in 1989/90, because they thought that conditions in the self-liberated countries were not comparable to those in the West. There were people who criticised this move. Given the fact that there were over 100 registered political parties in Poland after 1988/1989, the EPP was advised – in vain – to invite just one “team” from the various different Polish “Christian” groups to join it. Polish politicians, including Bronis³aw Geremek, even floated the example of the French centrist political party UDF, but this was also in vain.

At the end of May 1947, the NEI finally dared to go public and held its first conference, at Chaudfontaine in Belgium. The meeting had such a magnetic effect that the Western Europeans found they were no longer alone: the Czech Popular Party and the exiled Polish Labour Party, for example, sent delegates. The Frenchman Robert Bichet was appointed president of the NEI; the Belgian Jules Soyeur became Secretary General.

Leadership committee meetings were held hereafter three times a year, but this nevertheless did not in practice take decisions based on a majority vote, but operated according to the consensus principle (unanimity).

The NEI’s first “bureau” was based in Brussels, and this was followed by another in Paris in 1950. 1951 saw the emergence of the Association of Christian Democratic Students, an umbrella organisation for young Christian Democrats. The NEI drew up plans for a regular magazine, but these 165

were dropped following the realisation that the NEI had no more money than its predecessor the SIPDIC. Decisive progress was made, not by officials of the embryonic NEI, but by voters in the part of Europe that remained free. They saw to it that, for a time, each of the six nations which had joined together to form the European Coal and Steel Community following Robert Schuman’s call of 9 May 1950 was led by a Christian Democrat government chief who had completely rejected Hitler and Mussolini prior to 1945.

Unlike its forefathers in the years after 1918, the NEI and its members now had a clear common vision – the unification of Europe. They set about “integrating” free states in a way never tried before in history and without any existing blueprint. Although their political opponents claimed again that the NEI was nothing other than an association controlled remotely by the Vatican and was intended to “restore a clerical Charlemagne empire” (meaning Charles the Great), people were more convinced by the successful rebuilding of Western Europe in alliance with the USA than they were by such polemic.

The organisational weakness of the NEI was offset at the time by the fact that its leading politicians met regularly, e.g. at confidential “Geneva Talks”. The NEI was also driven by the “Cold War” between Moscow and the Free World, as it worked to help Christian Democrats who had fled or been exiled from Central Eastern Europe. In 1950, the exiled representatives of Christian Democratic parties banned in Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Czechoslovakia and Slovenia under communist rule got together to form the “Christian Democratic Union of Central Europe” (CDUCE), the activities of which reached as far as the United Nations in New York.

In 1948, exiled Christian Democrats from Spain and Christian Democrat politicians who had fled the communists played an active role in setting up the ODCA (Christian Democratic Organization of America) in Montevideo. A transatlantic network began to be established. There were intercontinental conferences in Paris and Brussels, culminating in the creation of the “Christian Democratic World Union” (CDI) in Santiago de Chile in 1961, after which the NEI briefly set up a “European CDI arm”.

When the isolation of the Germans ended in the 1950s, Adenauer and his European friends played an important role in the NEI. They strengthened those groups that, unlike the French, wanted a more effective and strongly outward-looking organisation. Since the Italian Democrazia Italiana (DC) and the German Christian Democratic Union had been leading governments for years, whereas their French friends were being gradually ousted from power, the idea of a real party federation began to gain weight. Once again, people evoked the prestige that the Socialist International had acquired in the meantime, not least thanks to a strong media presence and the activities of personalities like Willy Brandt, Felipe Gonzales and Olof Palme. Even today, the left has the advantage in the German 166

media, where up to 70% of those employed in the sector are left-wingers.

In other central EU countries, e.g. Belgium and England, the proportion is thought to be 50%.

Alas, the Christian Democrat efforts were in vain! From an early stage, the NEI as an institution started to grow weaker rather than stronger. One reason for this was the return to power in May 1958 of General Charles de Gaulle, who was strongly opposed to the Christian Democratic idea. This only made the unremitting work of all those men and women who strove to carve out common ground between the European “Christian” parties, and who increased programme consensus, even more commendable.

What Charles de Gaulle had underestimated was the standardising power of the growing European institutions, in particular that of the ECSC from 1951, and that of the Economic Community (EEC) from 1957. The key political issue regarding the balance of power between individual states and “supranational” institutions in an integrated Europe became more urgent.

The Christian Democrats in the NEI considered the EEC, rightly, to be a great success in which they played a leading role. Nevertheless, they wanted to advance towards “political union” together with other likeminded Europeans. This plan was thwarted by Charles de Gaulle, who had returned as president of France in 1958, when the Algerian War was shaking the very foundations of France’s democracy. To begin with, de Gaulle had the support of most within the French Christian Democrat party Mouvement Républicain Populaire (MRP), which many other Christian Democrats found very difficult. However, the MRP broke off relations with him in 1962. Meanwhile, the MRP’s partners in the NEI stuck to their supranational concept on the path towards European integration, and called for a stronger common political front. In 1965, the time came, and the NEI was transformed into the European Union of Christian Democrats (EUCD).

The significance of the new name, which would affect all parties involved from then on, was threefold: y The association defined itself openly as “Christian Democratic”; y The new organisation joined together parties rather than individual people; y The term “International” (as contained in the name of the NEI) was replaced by “European”, expressing part of the programme.

The founding president of the EUCD was Mariano Rumor, a leading Italian. The NEI secretariat in Paris was closed and an “EUCD office” opened in Rome. Observers said later that the “Franco-centrism” of the European Christian Democrats, i.e. the French domination that had effectively been in place since 1947, was replaced in 1965 by an “Italian-German regime”.

This is not true. In fact, it was the beginning of an era in which parties from smaller countries also gained in influence. Of course it is true that 167

the Italians and the Germans dominated the EUCD in terms of financial contributions and the number of party members they had. From then on, it was parties as a whole that were united, not just individual players with a semi-personal agenda.

In 1965, the Fleming Leo Tindemans was appointed Secretary General of the EUCD. Tindemans was a particularly convincing representative of the supranational concept. This marked the beginning of a practice that is continued to this day in the EPP: the European Christian Democrat leadership consists of a clever and pragmatic balance of power between the “large” and the “small”. The French resisted joining with their party in 1965, and until 1976 were represented in the EUCD by a “team”, which admittedly was run with great prudence by the longstanding president of the French Senate and de Gaulle critic Alain Poher.

The process used to test parties wanting to join the EUCD is still interesting today. The Political Bureau, the Union’s most senior leadership body between conferences, formed an investigating committee that probed candidates’ programmes and policies and also checked their “alliances”.

Any party, for example, that associated “at home” with anti-European, nationalist forces, either in their own national governments or in parliament, would not stand a chance. The same went for parties that did not distance themselves clearly from left-wing extremists. There is no doubt that today’s EPP would behave in the same way. Whether it can stick to its old list of questions in future remains to be seen.

The new alliance discovered better working methods. It set about drawing up statutes and unanimously formulated Christian Democratic maxims. Moreover, it became more open to the media. Between 1965 and 1978, the alliance held landmark conferences in Taormina, Venice, Bonn and Berlin.

German Protestant CDU politician Kai-Uwe von Hassel took over as president of the EUCD in 1973, while the Italian Arnaldo Forlani replaced Leo Tindemans as Secretary General. The member parties appointed experts to be permanent members of EUCD bodies. The strength of individual parties was balanced out by the “confederal” nature of the Political Bureau, which was made up of five delegates from each party, regardless of their size. Although this meant progress was slow and laboured, the EUCD did grow together as an organisation. Slowly but surely, a common awareness took hold.

The joint Christian Democrat faction, which proved itself in the European Parliament, became the most important force. Its political strength was due to the 1952 ruling of the “Advisory Assembly of the ECSC” that it would no longer represent political interests according to country, but rather “transnationally” in “political families”. As we will see later on, the role of the faction gained in significance from one year to the next, and this trend is on-going.

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The EUCD founding conference in Taormina, Sicily in 1965 was highly political. The Christian Democrats went all out to defend their concept of the “Community” (of Europe) against the attacks of Charles de Gaulle, who rejected supranational institutions as building blocks of integration.

The EUCD then spoke out strongly in favour of the independence of the EEC Commission in Brussels, called for the constant pressure for unanimity in the Council of Ministers to be abolished, and fought for the introduction of majority decisions. Of course, they also called for an authentic European Parliament that was freely and directly elected by the nations.

In other words, the EUCD remained faithful to the Christian Social ideas of Robert Schuman.

The second EUCD conference was held in Venice in 1968 at a time of great unrest among the academic youth of Western Europe: May 1968 in Paris, student protests in Germany, “squattings” in the Netherlands. As a result, the EUCD also debated various political reforms such as worker participation and the renewal of universities. Nevertheless, European policy demands were also submitted.

The 1973 conference in Bonn was marked by a change in Western Ostpolitik; the CDU/CSU had been sitting on the opposition benches since 1969. Willy Brandt was in power, and Richard von Weizsäcker (CDU, D) gave an important speech that turned the EUCD’s focus onto ethical issues. The new phrase “quality of life” entered the debate. However, the different traditions of the EUCD parties once again became apparent. There was still no real common Christian Democratic doctrine.

However, just three years later, in Paris in 1976, the EUCD succeeded in adopting its first European Christian Democrat Manifesto, put together with valuable help from allied groups and institutes and the EUCD’s information and documentation centre in Rome. Unfortunately, the EUCD was again unable to produce a magazine, because it could not afford a big enough print run. Nevertheless, during those years it did manage to produce 25 issues of Christlich-Demokratisches Panorama, the editors of which also tried to analyse developments in Eastern Europe and other parts of the world. The Dutchman Karl-Josef Hahn and the Italian Roberto Papini made an outstanding contribution to this.

The writing of the EUCD’s Paris manifesto had increased the debate around a “more EC-appropriate” form of cooperation. People thought that, because of the Cold War, there would be some parties that would only able to operate within the “loosely knit organisation” of the EUCD for the foreseeable future. The parties within the EC, however, had long benefited from a powerful, self-financed and independently equipped organisation, namely the above-mentioned Strasbourg parliamentary group. Before I move on to discuss the EPP, I must first consider the development of this group in relation to power politics.

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After the fall of communism in 1989/1990, there were some politicians from Central and Eastern European who could only imagine their country being represented in the European Parliament if all Hungarian, Polish, Czech and Lithuanian parliamentarians sat together in a “national block”.

This was also what West Europeans thought when they set up the socalled “ECSC Advisory Assembly” in the 1950s.

In 1952, however, the Christian Democrats broke out of the mould of the old way of thinking and formed a “transnational” group with friends from all six member countries. It was not the ECSC treaty that had prompted them to do this, but their experience of cooperating within the NEI, where they had become convinced that their European parliamentarians should be Christian Democrat allies first and foremost, not representatives of national parties. The first Christian Democrat party in the ECSC, the “CD Group”, had 38 members to begin with, of a total 78 representatives in the Common Assembly. Later, it had 66 members out of a total 142 representatives.

The group therefore did not have an absolute majority, nor did it get one later on. In any case, there was never much room in Strasbourg for this kind of problem, which had more to do with the life of national parliaments. In Strasbourg, the dividing lines ran more often between “Europeans” and “anti-Europeans” than between “right” and “left”. The traditional, nation state-type fronts are only really forming now because the Parliament has more authority and is thus more likely to be involved in arguments over issues that allow for “left” and “right” views.

Over time, “centre” party delegates began to wonder how they could become more involved with the EPP Group in their daily political work.

Some nearly always agreed with the EPP, the strongest “centre” force in the house, and so it made sense for them to have a say in the EPP Group themselves.

At that time, group chairman Egon A. Klepsch (CDU, D) won over a Danish conservative delegate, and then delegates from the Greek “Nea Demokratia” party joined the EPP Group. Finally, even former French President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, once a liberal delegate, left his party and joined the EPP Group, together with a number of friends.

A peculiar situation arose when the British conservative MEPs decided they would rather have a say in the EPP camp than continue to form different coalitions on a case-by-case basis. For a while, the whole conservative faction went over to the centre. Unfortunately, the pact did not last. Although many Britons continued to have pro-European views, they lost support at their headquarters in London. After 1989, the national leadership of the British conservatives became increasingly opposed to the postulate of integration, ceased to support the Court of European Justice in Luxembourg, and blocked moves towards integration. In the 2009 European elections, the British conservatives formed a new group of Euro170

phobic delegates that included members from Poland and the Czech Republic. So far, the new group has argued a lot and produced hardly anything in the way of positive results.

The term “European Parliament” was introduced into political usage in 1958, although the official name was “Assembly”, at the request of the French. Its two “counterparts” were the Brussels Commission and the Council of Ministers, both of which became so strong as a result of the 1957 Treaties of Rome that there could be no question of the parliamentarians “rising up”, as hotheads had hoped. The parties were at the time made up of delegates from national parliaments who would meet for a few weeks a year (much less than nowadays) to deliberate in Strasbourg or (in the case of parliamentary committees) in Brussels. The idea behind this was that there should be a close informative and political link to the dispatching parliament. All too often, however, European delegates were left alone with their problems, as people at home generally did not understand their work.

EUCD and EPP. When the Community began to hold new discussions on reform, triggered on the one hand by the death of de Gaulle (1969) and on the other by the accession of the British, the Danes and the Irish (1973), parts of the CD group within the European Parliament started to become increasingly dissatisfied with the EUCD as coordinator. Development had all but silted up, and there were no signs of new inspiration.

Although the Rome headquarters managed the EUCD quite well, it struggled to emerge from the shadow of the Socialist International. Once again, it was thanks to the efforts of a few that the EUCD made progress as an organisation.

Together with a few friends drawn from all the “Christian” parties, Hans-August Lücker (D), group chairman between 1969 and 1975, Parliamentary President Alain Poher (F), and EUCD President Mariano Rumor (I) drafted statutes that led to a major improvement in cooperation between the party group and the EUCD from 1971 onwards. Just one year later, the EUCD formed a special committee, a nucleus of the later EPP, comprising only politicians from EC states. A network of working groups was set up, which had the financial help of the group to thank for its success.

Some observers outside the EU are still astonished today at the initiatives kick-started at that time by Christian Democrats in their national parliaments, with the aim of bringing about early direct elections to the European Parliament. In the Netherlands, for example, the Christian Democrats said the people should be able to play a direct part in the integration of Europe, but that this would not make national parliaments superfluous. Even today, Christian Democrats have more faith in the abilities and the achievements of the European Parliament than many conservatives and even many liberals do.

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The idea of “creating a European Christian Democratic party” is mentioned for the first time in the minutes of a CD group meeting held in Strasbourg on 12 June 1974.

At last, a logical political goal began to emerge from the fog. Hans-August Lücker spurred on the discussion and proposed that the said committee should have a dedicated secretary general based in Brussels. The progressive Bavarian argued that they would need to write some kind of programme, manifesto or proclamation before the first national elections. He failed at first, although some support was forthcoming from the European Union of Young Christian Democrats, for example.

Democratic Liberal Christian Democrat and Social movement Conservative renewal

One trunk from three roots

In September 1975, a working group called the “European Party” set to work on concrete projects. It was jointly led by Wilfried Martens, then chairman of the Flemish CVP, and Hans-August Lücker. On 20 February 1976, they presented draft statutes for the planned party to the Political Committee.

There was still a considerable obstacle in the way, as people could not agree on a name for the new party. The name had been left blank in the draft statutes, and this was the most important thing as far as the public was concerned. On the surface it was about pragmatism: should they “invite” British and Danish MEPs who came from conservative rather than Christian parties to join? The EUCD did not have any Christian member parties in either Denmark or Great Britain. Those in favour of these parties joining called for a loophole which could have enabled the “Christian Democrat” part of the name to be dropped at a later stage. Those against were not directly “opposed to the loophole” but rejected new names: “It is clearly a matter of our Christian identity.”

The Germans presented their positive experiences of “integrating conservatives” after 1945. The Benelux parties and the parties from France, Italy and Ireland were critical and sceptical in their response. The Germans were invited to discuss rapprochement with the conservatives outside the planned European party, in a kind of club. It was pointed out that there had also been moves in Western Europe towards cooperation and pooling forces on the left.

Eventually, people began to consider the term “People’s Party”. It had been used in a few countries with great success, including some outside the EUCD, e.g. in Austria. In the end, they went with the long-winded but universally approved “European People’s Party”, with the subtitle “Fed172

eration of Christian Democratic Parties in the European Community”. Later the subtitle shrank, at first in the European Parliament, to the abbreviation “EPP/CD”. It is clear from the media today that some of the objections were not entirely without foundation. Under the influence of the left, the EPP is often and speculatively referred to as “the conservative European party”, whereas in reality it unites forces from the Christian and liberal centre, although its membership does of course also include Conservatives. It is the left-wing press in particular that manipulates the facts.

They know that the term “conservative” has mainly negative connotations for women and younger voters throughout the EU. In February 2010, the Allensbach Institute for Public Opinion Research, which is justifiably respected throughout Europe, presented the findings of research into political terms that are controversial among the ruling class. According to this, around 80% of Germans become defensive at the mere mention of the term “conservative”. Yet, although half of Germans would no longer describe themselves as Christian, 63% believe “Christian” is a positive term. In spite of frequent protests from people like Wilfried Martens and Hans-Gert Pöttering, nearly all the media people in Brussels insist on calling the EPP “conservative” rather than “Christian Democratic”, even though its name is clear and “conservative” only applies to a subset of the EPP Group, and one which is not involved in leadership. The fact that the EPP continues to be referred to in this way is unfortunately the fault of many its own people, but not for instance the Dutch, who are always called “Christian Democrats” in their country.

The federation idea that originated in Europe was useful to the development of the EPP, although until 1995 it did cost them some consistency.

However, the EPP Group was always the most solid anchor in European reality. It had members at every level of the party, not least as “natural” delegates at EPP conferences.

In March 1978, i.e. in the run-up to the first elections, the EPP held its first conference. Its president, the Belgian Leo Tindemans, was an internationally respected, Europe proponent and federally-minded politician. Tindemans taught at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and was a member of the Jean Monnet Committee between 1960 and 1975. After his election to the position of EPP president, he made a huge effort to present the new party to the public prior to the European elections, which finally took place in 1979 after a lot of quarrelling. The new European elections were “direct elections”, in other words, the peoples themselves were now directly responsible for deciding who would represent them. It was no longer the case that delegates were simply sent from national parliaments.

The second EPP conference, which was held in February 1979, was dominated by this election to an even greater extent, but the EPP’s influence on its national parties was on the whole disappointingly small. Even 173

today, European elections are usually preceded by national election campaigns, because people are concerned about securing as many seats as possible for their own party within the national contingent going to Strasbourg. This situation is not satisfactory.

The 1982 the fourth EPP conference was held in Par- Hans-Gert Pรถttering presents Pope John Paul II is. It was attended by Hel- with the Robert Schuman Medal mut Kohl, marking the first time a German government chief had been present. Other heads of state who were also members of the EPP in its first ten years included Garret Fitzgerald of Ireland, the Belgians Tindemans and Martens, the Dutchmen Andries van Agt and Ruud Lubbers, the Luxembourger Jacques Santer, and the Greek national Konstantin Mitsotakis. At the time, the EPP Group was led by Egon A. Klepsch (D), who had done an excellent job of developing international relations between young Christian Democrats in the 1960s. Klepsch was succeeded in 1982 by Paolo Barbi (I), before being reelected group chairman in 1984. Egon A. Klepsch also held the position of president of the European Parliament between 1992 and 1994. The group has since been led by Wilfried Martens (B), Hans-Gert Pรถttering (D) and Joseph Daul (F).

It is perhaps true to say that the EPP has been shaped more by outstanding personalities than by seminal EPP documents produced on the basis of thorough research and a sense of reality. This is because political customs are no different at European level than they are at national level.

In the early years, there was still a strong Italian presence in the EPP leadership. Subsequently, however, the party was led by Leo Tindemans (1976-1985), the Dutchman Piet Bukmans (1985-1987), the Luxembourger Jacques Santer (1987-1990), and Wilfried Martens.

The development of the EPP and the diversity of the federation were reflected in the style of the conferences, which naturally were held in different capital cities across the European Union. There was a conference in the south of the continent that was attended by over 2000 people and had so many speakers there was hardly room for proper democratic debate. The organisers of a conference in the capital of one of the Benelux countries did an excellent job of ensuring that delegates could express their views and that working groups were fruitful. There were conferences marked by the national election campaign of a single member (Spain 174

1995), and that were completely taken over by large-scale politics (Dublin 1990, after German reunification).

Prior to the third European elections in 1989, the EPP presidency had gained enough experience to be able to make a realistic assessment of what it could expect to achieve in election campaigns, given its modest means. “Modest” because the EPP does not receive large financial contributions from the national parties. Still, the EPP Group – as the EPP’s “operative arm” – was very active, and won 121 of 518 seats, although this was not many given that the number of seats in the Parliament had increased following the accession of the Spanish and the Portuguese. Iberian EPP members won 19 seats, not least through the resignation of the members of the Spanish People’s Party, formerly People’s Alliance, from the European Democrats, which still existed at the time.

The eighth conference in Dublin in 1990, which was marked by the end of the Cold War, was as significant as the EC Summit in the same year: y An Intergovernmental Conference was set up in December 1990.

It compiled the Maastricht Treaty. After the reasonable success of the Common Market, the aim now was to tackle what the Christian Democrats had been demanding for 40 years, namely the European (Political) Union; y The consequences of German reunification needed to be discussed, e.g. Bonn expected more MEPs – 99 instead of 81 – in view of the 18 million-strong population in the former GDR; y The issue of security was raised again: how should they go about setting up a “European pillar of NATO” in the future? y Guests from countries previously oppressed under communism met in Dublin to ask the EPP for help with establishing democracy; y For the first time, the EPP’s conference document played a large role in the European Parliament. With Margaret Thatcher’s resignation came the (misguided) hope that London could cooperate constructively, and there was the sense of a new era about to dawn, although this was soon dampened by political unrest followed by armed conflict in the Balkans; Nevertheless, the Maastricht Treaty brought about progress in 1991/1992, even though the expectations of the European Parliament were disappointed to a large extent, and the opposition between London and the Continent became apparent again in the area of foreign and security policy.

Friends from Eastern and Central Eastern Europe now wanted to know above all how they could one day benefit from EPP membership. However, EPP presidents and Secretary Generals have always stressed over the years that the EPP is fundamentally only what its national member parties make it. Only the practically autonomous EPP Groups in the European Parliament, the European Council, the WEU Assembly and the EU Committee of the 175

Regions can shape some “EPP reality” for themselves. What does this mean for the life of nationally active parties from Poland, Hungary, etc.?

These were and still are the five test questions that the EPP puts to prospective member parties: 1. Are your EPP conference delegates elected at national party conferences or just appointed by the party leadership?

2. What is your approach to appointing people to EPP executive committees? Do you tend to choose “international experts” or elected representatives who are known in the EU? 3. Do you make an appropriate financial contribution to the EPP? 4. What role do EPP delegates play in your party, e.g. on executive boards and regional committees?

5. Do you take care to popularise the EPP in national party publications?

Practices differ a great deal. Several of the smaller countries have always been more serious about international action than some of the larger countries. But development also requires time and the presence of national “EPP champions” in the parties, which have after all often succeeded in sending many democratically elected delegates and members of the EPP presidency to Brussels.

EPP conferences can rarely act spontaneously, even when they have been planned by creative people, as there are now more official EU languages in use than ever before. This alone restricts spontaneity. Also, as with international conferences, important documents have to be put to the vote before the conference, and often toned down if they are to be approved. One of the consequences of such toil and trouble is that many “big shots” stay away from the main EPP stage, as there is none of the usual national media attention there to attract them.

A few words on the EPP statutes, i.e. on the party’s modus operandi.

The presidency (earlier: Political Bureau) meets at least four times a year.

It has a wide remit, ranging from political duties to controlling its own budget. As set out in the EPP statutes, the presidency is rather large. The composition of the presidency does not in any way reflect the size of individual member parties. Like so many other European bodies that are perfectly entitled to take decisions based on a majority vote, the EPP executive usually refrains from such trials and seeks instead to find a consensus, nearly always with success. Stubborn individuals “need not apply”.

The president and the presidency represent the EPP to the outside world, and the vice presidents also play an important role. The number of these vice presidents has risen sharply over the course of time, not least because there are now more than twenty member parties. As a result, their overall influence has decreased.

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The Secretary General is elected on the recommendation of the president. The strong mutual dependence of the two most senior people has long proven a basis for trust in many national parties. The EPP thus successfully adopted the model. Until 1983 – i.e. for seven years – MEPs were almost like Secretary Generals or their deputies on the side. This did not prove successful, and was criticised in public for the fact that, among other things, salaries were channelled away from the Parliament. This changed with the contractual recognition of transnational parties. It was then decided to have a full-time EPP Secretary General, who would at first also work for the EUCD, and this promoted the integration of the two Christian Democrat unions.

Over the course of time, the General Secretariat was expanded through the recruitment of highly qualified multilingual personnel from several countries. Premises were found close to the European Parliament building in Brussels. The party began publishing important documentation in the main EU languages. Since 1995, there has also been an EPP information service called “EPP NEWS”, which is now sent by out fax, and Europe seminars for the press officers of member parties. The General Secretariat works closely with the Group, the Luxembourg-based Robert Schuman Foundation, and the foundations of a number of EPP parties. Under the presidency of Wilfried Martens, the EPP reviewed and amended its statutes in 1995, and the top bodies were streamlined. The latest modifications were made at the EPP conference in Bonn in January 2010.

The presidency, which was scaled down in 1995, is in office for three years and performs its managerial function at least eight times a year.

Nowadays, it is also involved in pre-EU Summit policy talks, together with members of the European Commission and EU heads of government who are also members of the EPP. The presidency is a relatively large body that includes the representatives of the EPP’s various associations. It thus constitutes an essential opinion forum between conferences. The creation of an “EPP Council” (Article 7) enables the leaders of the member parties to work closely with the EPP presidency.

Each time new rumours circulate, President Wilfried Martens is asked what the EPP really is, both officially and politically, to which he replies, “we are a European party in accordance with Article 138a of the Maastricht Treaty”. This should be obvious to, for example, members of the House of Commons, the Sejm, or the Bundestag, as should the fact that all transnational parties receive finances from the EU budget, which they must be able to demonstrate that they have spent on Europe-related matters, down to the last cent. The EPP has been pleased in recent years about the comparative lack of media griping on this subject.

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Shortly before this book was completed, it emerged that EPP President Wilfried Martens had decided, after some hesitation, that the EPP should draw up a new Basic Programme. The current Programme was adopted by the EPP conference in Athens in 1992. Valéry Giscard d’Estaing was in charge of drawing up the Programme back then, and he proved himself an excellent mediator right up until the eleventh hour before the vote.

What Wilfried Martens is now initiating will be far more difficult than in 1992. Old Christian Democrat parties from the core states of Europe have made significant adjustments to their national programmes, generally towards the centre-left, but also towards the right. Although these “place names” do not mean much any more, they are endemic in the media. In practice, a few “Christian parties” are involved in Christian Liberal or Christian Social politics, and are increasingly less likely to form a coalition with a right-wing party. However, there are exceptions in the West, and even more in the East. All these developments will play a part as the EPP works to draw up a new Basic Programme. The EPP Group as the largest group in the European Parliament will once again bear a lot of responsibility for implementing the president’s idea. It will have to be even more firmly committed to unity than the parties that support the EPP.

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The Christian Democrats’ Robert Schuman Foundation The European Robert Schuman Foundation is a Christian Democratic/ Christian Social institution that has developed gradually over the past 23 years. The German CDU politician Egon A. Klepsch, who was at the time president of the EPP Group in the European Parliament, first came up with the idea of a “Foundation for Christian Democracy”, together with Horst Langes (Trier), around the time of the fall of the Berlin Wall. The idea quickly attracted support among their friends in Europe. It was also the result of lively debates among European Christian Democrats during those turbulent years.

Unlike other party political “families” in Europe, e.g. the German SPD, Klepsch and other leading members of the EPP Group from several countries were not content to simply observe the changes that in 1984 had begun to take place in the ailing communist bloc from a distance.

They travelled right to the heart of the crises – e.g. their visit to Poland during the martial law period – both on their own and as part of a wider delegation.

They subsequently sensed what might happen in the event of widespread democratisation in Eastern Europe from Estonia to Bulgaria. In 1987/88, the EPP Group and its members set up a foundation to support democrats in Central, South Eastern and Eastern Europe, but also in Latin America and Africa. The foundation has its headquarters in Luxembourg (city), and is overseen by the state of Luxembourg. Soon after its establishment, the foundation was named after the “father of Europe”, Robert Schuman.

The primary aim of the RSF was as far as possible to provide “help for people by people”, with the focus being on students and young politicians. Interested young parties could apply to join the RSF’s stagiaire programme in Brussels, provided they brought with them political recommendations. The number of stagiaires increased from 19 in 1990/91 to 40 in 2004, reaching a total of 428 in 2005. Up to the present day, the RSF has had 603 stagiaires.

Young people are applying to join the stagiaire programme from more and more European countries. Up until 2004, the RSF operated with annual funds of around • 700,000 (for all activities and projects including the stagiaire programme); however, this sum fell to • 550,000 in 2006, and is now even less, because of falling bank interest rates. Nevertheless, the foundation has been able to maintain the high quality of its activities, because – with the exception of a few books and documents that it paid for in full – the foundation prefers to make (modest!) contributions to

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external projects. Since 2004, the focus of the stagiaire programme has widened because of the growth in the number of EU member states. The number of stagiaires from Poland has been particularly high.

The success of the stagiaire programme is calculable. The majority of participants have remained true to politics and the programme has given their political work a fresh impetus. Below are just three examples of the career development of former RSF stagiaires: y Former stagiaire Péter Olajos from Hungary became an MEP in the 2004 European elections; y György Hölvényi, also from Hungary, became spokesman for the Hungarian MEP group, and is now Secretary General of the Robert Schuman Foundation in Brussels; y Pawel Moras of Wroc³aw worked in local politics and became secretary of the politically significant German-Polish youth organisation in Warsaw.

Several young women and men have become assistants in the European Parliament or other European institutions, while others are working on European problems in national parliaments and parties, and in administration. The ruling of the German Constitutional Court on the Lisbon Treaty should mean a sharp increase in the number of Europe specialists advising national delegates in all 27 capital cities. What an opportunity for RSF stagiaires!

The foundation can only reach its full potential by cooperating with other foundations, or with parties, academic institutes, professional associations and unions. Below is a list of some of RSF’s partner organisations to demonstrate this: The Konrad Adenauer Foundation (D), the National Democratic Christian Party (RO), the EPP-ED Workers’ Group (EPP member), the Eduardo Frei Foundation (Chile), the Jarl Hjalmarsson Foundation (S), the Italian Christian Workers’ Movement (I), the Democratic Party of Albania (AL), the Polish Robert Schuman Foundation, the Civic Platform/PO (PL), the European Union of Women (EPP member), the Foundation for Social Studies and Analysis (E), International Youth Dialogue (NL), the Hanns Seidel Foundation (D), the Pontifical University of John Paul II in Kraków (PL), the Democrat Union of Africa, Paneuropa Youth, the Balkan and Eastern European Forum (GR), the Christian Democratic People’s Party of Moldova (MD), and the Hungarian SME association KKVE (HU).

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Interview with RSF Honorary President Horst Langes Jürgen Wahl The Schuman Foundation (RSF) is quite clear about the fact that it wants to contribute to cooperation between Christian Democrats in Europe. Who had the idea?

Horst Langes Egon Klepsch and I in 1987. He was leading the EPP Group in the European Parliament and I was a member of this group.

JW So you were already active before the fall of communism?

Jürgen Wahl (left) and Horst Langes

HL We were indeed. In 1987, we began looking at how and where we could set up a foundation to strengthen Christian democracy. We had recognised that neither our group nor the EPP as a party was in a position to be able to introduce young people outside the EEC to the “idea of Europe” in practice.

JW So the widely-held opinion that your foundation is only there for Eastern Europe is wrong?

HL It’s very wrong indeed, because one of the key questions at the time was how we could help the emerging democracies in Latin America, some of which were Christian democratic. We particularly wanted to attract young people to become involved in the developments taking place there.

JW Who became involved in the foundation?

HL The EPP Group and its members supported us straight away, for example. Others joined in. There was general agreement about setting up a foundation. This turned out to be difficult from a legal point of view in Brussels, but it was easy in Luxembourg. We called ourselves the “Foundation for Cooperation between European Christian Democrats”; the name “Robert Schuman” didn’t come until later. We were welcomed with open arms in Luxembourg, and were able to get the foundation off the ground before the Berlin Wall came down.

JW What steps did you take after the fall of the Wall?

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HL We immediately focused our activities on attracting young women and men from the newly liberated countries between the Baltic and the Black Sea. It soon became clear that Poland would have a special role to play.

JW I understand you only have limited resources, but the number of people knocking on your door has increased constantly since 1989. How do you deal with this?

HL During the first years of our establishment, we collected ten million in foundation capital. For years, our work has been paid for using just the interest earned on this amount. That means we have to be economical.

Unfortunately, we are earning less interest at the moment. Yet our focus remains the same: we want to convince young people – the very best young people, of course – of the importance of the idea of Europe. We would also like to stay in contact with them, once they have left Brussels and returned home. We publish documents about the politics of the European Christian Democrats. We also invite former stagiaires back to attend seminar-like conferences.

Robert Schuman Foundation stagiaires Rafa³ Budnik, Poland My time in Brussels was one of the most important experiences of my life, and not only because I was the first Robert Schuman Foundation stagiaire after 1989! As well as being offered a practice-oriented study visit, I was also invited to reflect on European politics, to think through Poland’s role in the new European reality, and to investigate the position of Christians in politics and public life. Moreover, I was given the chance to get to know both people and institutions better.

The stay in Brussels, the many discussions with politicians, the opportunities to make and develop contacts – often not easy for us Poles – all of this helped me form my own political opinions and take personal decisions. I tried several new activities: for example, back in Poland, as a young entrepreneur, I became involved in producing some distinctively European information, in particular leaflets, that focused on the European Union and the EPP (European People’s Party = Christian Democrats).

Educating Polish citizens about what a growing and united Europe looks like, and about the identity of authentic Christian Democrats in Europe, was something that required time and a measure of good luck.

I was one of the lucky ones.

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¡ ¡ Zivilé Didzgalviené, Lithuania I was a Schuman stagiaire in November 2001, and in just this one month I became very familiar with the politics and activities of the European Parliament. I observed the committee work and the plenary assembly in Strasbourg.

I had great opportunities to talk with delegates and officials. I also visited the Council (seat of the councils of ministers), the European Commission, NATO headquarters, and other institutions and NGOs. This time was very important for me and my career. I work in the field of political science, and at the very time that my country was endeavouring to join the EU, I was able to see how “things” worked in reality. It was also good to meet stagiaires from other countries and improve my language skills.

Robert Schuman Foundation publications To begin with, the Robert Schuman Foundation only published very few titles itself. It was more involved in supporting partner projects. One exception was Poland, where the foundation began cooperating with a publishing company at an early stage. This resulted in the launch of the so-called “Blue Series” in 1991. This series consisted of six different booklets on the subjects of European integration, the European People’s Party, the European Parliament, the regions of Europe, problems of minorities, and European security policy. A few of the titles were also published in other languages. We also decided to honour the patron of our foundation, Robert Schuman, with a largish biography in several languages.

In 1994/1995, there followed a series of booklets directly from Luxembourg and Brussels. One of these, for example, was by Horst Langes and was on the subject of “The Role of the Churches in Central and Eastern Europe”. With the help of the EPP Group, the Robert Schuman Institute in Budapest also published a series on the problems of democratic development in Central and Eastern Europe. This institute was set up by the EPP Group, the parties in the EPP and the Robert Schuman Foundation.

We began, then, by offering an introduction to the European People’s Party and the work of Leaflets for Poland its delegates in the European Par183

liament in six different languages. It started with small booklets and ended with books containing the whole history of the European Christian Democrats, the development of the EPP programmes, and additional material from the Parliament. The publication of the book EPP: Your Majority in Europe, which is written in English and contains up-to-date contact details for all the parties that are either members of the EPP or cooperate with it, marked a particular high point. A separate version was printed for Poland with an appendix containing the names of the Polish MEPs elected in 2004. A textbook by N. Neuhaus and H. Langes on the subject of Christian Democracy was published in English, Romanian, and Ukrainian, and has proven very successful.

In the run-up to 1 May 2004, when ten countries joined the EU, the foundation produced a one-off series of pamphlets in several languages supporting the accession process. The series refuted prejudices against “Brussels”, explained the Parliament again, and supported the candidates running in the 2004 parliamentary elections.

From the Statutes of the Robert Schuman Foundation “The ‘Foundation for Cooperation Between Christian Democrats in Europe’ (today the ‘Robert Schuman Foundation’) shall pursue exclusively and solely non-profit-making aims, on the basis of Christian ideals and Christian Democratic policies. In particular it shall: • promote the training and further training of gifted young people of suitable character; • provide political education; • take steps to strengthen democracy and pluralism in Europe and the world; • encourage international cooperation; • make the results of its activities available to the general public by the production of publications; • support moves towards European union.

The Foundation may carry out all the above-mentioned activities itself or may assist and support all centres, institutions, associations, groups and persons pursuing the same or similar aims to the Foundation. The Foundation shall use all its personnel, material and non-material resources to fulfil these duties, both at home and abroad.”

The Founding Statutes of the Robert Schuman Foundation were signed in Luxembourg in 1989 by seven Christian Democrat MEPs, namely Egon A. Klepsch (D), Chairman of the EPP Group in the European Parliament, Consul Horst Langes (D), Andrea Bonetti (I), Conçeptio 184

Ferrer (E), Johanna Maij-Weggen (NL), Nicolas Estgen (L), and Françisco Lucas Pires (P).

The foundation also appointed a board of trustees when it was first set up. This comprised 15 well-known MEPs plus former party chiefs Pierre Pflimlin, Emilio Colombo, Hans-August Lücker and Paolo Barbi.

The new presidium of the Robert Schuman Foundation from 2010: President: Jacques Santer (L) Honorary President: Horst Langes (D) Secretary General: György Hölvényi (H) Treasurer: Per Stenmarck (S) Members: Michael Gahler (D), Ms Kinga Gál (H), Dr Othmar Karas (A), Jaime Mayor Oreja (E), Ria Oomen-Ruijten (NL), Alojz Peterle (SLO), Mario Mauro (I), Jan Olbrycht (PL), Ioannis Kasoulides (GR), Tunne Kelam (EST), Paulo Rangel (P), Joseph Daul (F, ex officio)

Pictured, left to right (not all members are present): Tunne Kelam, Jaime Mayor, Jan Olbrycht, Paul Rangel, Michael Gahler, Alojz Peterle, Kinga Gál, Jaques Santer (President), Ria Oomen-Ruiten, Othmar Karas, Marion Mauro, Joannis Kasoulides, Horst Langes (Honorary President), Klaus Kellersmann, György Hölvényi (Secretary General).

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Schuman stagiaires: reunions and exchanges of experience Some of the regular seminars with former stagiaires that have been held since the stagiaire programme began demonstrate the concept perfectly: observe EU development, analyse new decisions. It has also proven useful to ask some participants to provide reports from their countries.

In 1996, the foundation staged seminars in Budapest and Visegrád in Hungary. The Hungarians spoke about how democracy was being established in their country, and the Dutch vice president of the European Commission, Hans van den Broek, gave an insight into the Brussels workshop: how the Commission approaches long-term planning.

In 1997, the foundation held a seminar at Nadolne near Gdañsk. Here, the focus was on EU regional policy in connection with traffic planning.

At the time, unjustified rumours were flying around about the euro, so the foundation staged a presentation outlining the views of the EPP Group on creating a European currency – this had long been in the pipeline. Located as it was on the edge of the Kashubia settlement area, the seminar also dealt with EU minority rights policy. Of course, the delegates also visited the memorial at Westerplatte, where Hitler launched his attack on Poland on 1 September 1939.

In 1999, the foundation held its seminar in Brussels, not in “new Europe” again. The participants saw “their” parliament again, and did not just listen to speeches. They were able to talk with Helmut Kohl, and Ria Oomen-Ruijten and Wim van Velzen of the Netherlands, who had kickstarted a lot of activities in Eastern Europe. Van Velzen led the EPP working group that dealt with Central Eastern and Eastern Europe for many years, prior to EU expansion in 2004. The seminar also dealt with questions of European structure: Livio Filippi MEP talked about the group of officials that play an important role in all EPP parties.

In 2000, at the turn of the millennium, the meeting of former stagiaires took place in Wroc³aw, one of Poland’s most dynamic cities. The former German capital of Silesia is the hometown of many former stagiaires, and now they were able to show their friends how European their city is in his life and planning. Once again, the subject under discussion was EU regional policy, this time – thanks to Horst Langes – the role of the Churches in the European process. Rocco Buttiglione of Rome, a well-known Italian politician active in cultural affairs, talked about Europe’s cultural roots.

Ro¿a Thun of the Polish Robert Schuman Foundation, now a PO MEP, analysed problems of the “culture shock” that many people were clearly experiencing on the “road to Brussels” prior to 2004, whether justifiably or not.

The foundation held another seminar in 2000, this time in Sofia, on “The prospects of positive change in South East Europe”. The meeting was supported by the EPP. Wim van Velzen (NL), the EPP’s celebrated 186

scout in the East, reported on his experiences, while Nadeshda Mihailova, the Bulgarian vice president of the EPP, outlined the problems faced by her country. There were country reports from former stagiaires, followed by contributions from prominent politicians from Romania, Greece, Serbia, Macedonia, Albania and Bulgaria. There was also a valuable exchange of experience on the subject of local politics.

In 2002, the foundation met in Strasbourg. Eastward expansion of the EU was fast approaching and the RSF was facing a new set of circum¡ ¡ stances: namely, Brussels and Strasbourg were going to have to modify the information they sent eastwards in the future. Potential stagiaires gained new career ideas, so the debate in Strasbourg centred on the wide variety of EU practices. Information was given on the constitutional debate, the scant and sometimes non-existent coverage of Europe by the media, and the differences between earlier and later accessions, e.g. between Spain/ Portugal on the one hand and Poland/Hungary on the other. The seminar also dealt with the situation in the Baltics, and Horst Langes talked about Christian Social positions that would need to be defended as integration took place.

2003, Rome. Italian President Azeglio Ciampi greeted the seminar, then the “exes” met Pope John Paul II. The theme for the three days sounded optimistic: “The New Europe”. Jacques Santer, the new president of the RSF, reported on his experiences as prime minister of Luxembourg and a participant at many EU summits. Rocco Buttiglione spoke again, this time on “Christian core values” in the Union, which was set to expand to 27 states. Bishop Tadeusz Pieronek (Kraków) and Hanna Suchocka, the Polish Ambassador to the Holy See, spoke about the concerns of her countrymen, and in particular of the Polish church, on the road towards a bigger Europe, and about how some believers felt confronted with a confusing array of different opinions and ways of life.

In 2005, again in Strasbourg, the RSF ventured a seminar that dealt with the potential development of the EU between 2004 and 2009. EPP Secretary General Antonio Lopez Isturiz spoke about his experiences in the EPP Group, which had grown sharply in 2004, and now had many deputies with no experience of Europe who were having to settle into surroundings long familiar to their Western friends. It was therefore beneficial to have Ria Oomen-Ruijten, who had a lot of experience of working with Africa, speak about what was happening beyond the borders of the EU, and remind people about expressing Christian Social solidarity with regard to the poverty in that continent.

In the meantime, the constitutional debate rumbled on, and older politicians explained to friends from Poland in particular the historical predicament, which meant that France, for example, could not use the word “God” in a constitution. Elmar Brok’s comment on the text of the constitution, “If God’s name isn’t allowed in it, then His Spirit must at least be in 187

it” met with general approval. There were several country reports, another discussion of the media situation in the acceding countries, and the seminar’s first ever consideration of right-wing extremism. This time, Alsatian Reformed Pastor Etienne Rebert presented the problems faced by Africa. Not for the first time, participants were able to exchange views with the leadership of the “Young EPP” (YEPP), represented in Strasbourg by their President David Hansen (Norway).

The 2007 seminar in Budapest marked the beginning of two informative dialogues which have since been fostered intensively by the EPP and which were both initiated and convincingly overseen by Stephen Biller (EPP Group). The first such dialogue was with the Orthodox Churches in Europe, and the second with Islamic partners. It was generally understood that these dialogues were always going to be difficult and should for this very reason be pursued.

RSF board member and coordinator Alojz Paterle (Slovenia) became particularly involved in the dialogues with the first group, and Mario Mauro (Italy), vice president of the European Parliament, in the talks with the second group. Another topic that was discussed in Budapest was climate change.

RSF President Jacques Santer Robert Schuman Institute Budapest: Erhard gave the main speech on this von der Bank with politics students subject.

2009 was a special year, marking as it did the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, when European reunification finally began to look like a reality, as evoked by Pope John Paul II in his speech to the European Parliament in 1988, when he said the continent needed to breathe at last with “both lungs”. Consequently, the RSF seminar was held in Berlin, supported by the EPP Group and the Konrad Adenauer Foundation.

Both Othmar Karas (A), Vice Chair of the EPP Group, and President Jacques Santer (L) warned of the dangers of relapsing into nationalism, brought on by financial crises and labour market deficiencies. Karas invoked Robert Schuman’s clear statement on the negative spin-offs of capitalism. Rudolf Seiters, a close friend of Helmut Kohl and president of the Red Cross, discussed the consequences of 9 November 1989 with Ro¿a Thun (PL) and Horst Langes. Erhard von der Bank (D) summarised his 20 years of providing political training at the Schuman Institute in Budapest. When Jacques Santer began his closing speech, there were more than one hundred people in the audience.

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The Kraków conferences Contributions made by the Robert Schuman Foundation to the dialogue between the Catholic Church and Christian Democratic European politicians An important annual conference in and near Kraków took place in September 2010 for the 10th time. There are good reasons for the fact that it does business under the name “Christian” and takes place in the famous former capital of Poland. One of these is John Paul II: the late Pope, who sought tirelessly to convince his homeland of the value of EU membership for Poland, was the Archbishop of Kraków, and appreciated the cosmopolitan spirit of the city on the upper reaches of the Vistula.

When the road “to Brussels” became even rougher for Poland after 1991, the Pope voiced his support for an attendant initiative being offered by the church in Kraków. This had been the idea of Bishop Tadeusz Pieronek, rector of the Pontifical Academy of Theology. Pieronek, a friend of the Pope, had already been through a kind of political baptism of fire in 1999. He opposed ultra-conservative Polish politicians on two occasions. Firstly, he expressed the opinion that the Church should keep out of elections and abandon party recommendations; and secondly, he proved himself more pro-European than the (then) majority of the Polish Bishops’ Conference.

The Robert Schuman Foundation learnt about the developments in Kraków via its time-proven contacts at the Kraków-based liberal Catholic weekly newspaper Tygodnik Powszechny, and also via Rafa³ Budnik, one of its first Brussels stagiaires, who owned a publishing house that started publishing European titles from an early date. His circle of friends included a number of pro-reform young politicians in Gliwice, who saw Poland’s future as being part of Europe – and achieved their goal in 2004 when Poland joined the EU.

Dialogues in Kraków: Bishops Hohmeyer and Pieronek, Stephan Raabe, Horst Langes

Jürgen Wahl, Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, Rafa³ Budnik, Lech Wa³êsa

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President Bronis³aw Komorowski in Kraków

W³adys³aw Bartoszewski and his friend Helmut Kohl

Subsequently, the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, the EPP Group in the European Parliament, and the European Bishops’ Conference (COMECE) all became involved in running the conferences, and the European Commission has lent its support.

Poland’s most well-known politicians have attended these conferences over the years, from Lech Wa³êsa, W³adys³aw Bartoszewski and Tadeusz Mazowiecki to Donald Tusk, Bronis³aw Komorowski and Waldemar Pawlak. The Vatican has regularly sent prominent cardinals, European ministers from many Western countries have become involved, and scholars have made respected contributions to the debate on Europe. A few of the conference titles show the extent to which the organisers have “had their finger on the pulse of the times”: “What kind of Christianity for Europe? – What kind of Europe for Christians?” // “Visions of the future – why are Christians necessary in Europe?” // “Controversy on religion and culture in Europe; Christianity, Islam, laicism” // “Challenges to European Civilisation”.

The conferences have always tried to remain up-to-date. Thus, in September 2009, the ninth conference dealt with the subject of “Christian challenges in the face of crises”. Each conference has attracted up to 200 participants, primarily from Poland. Rafa³ Budnik and his publishing house Wokol Nas has documented the conferences, supported by the foundations mentioned above.

Kraków has not been able to make a direct contribution to the development of fruitful relations between the EPP and Polish parties, but it has contributed indirectly. This is because, as so often in political life, the conferences have developed a large “informal fringe”, which has resulted not least in ever closer contacts between EPP politicians and friends from PO and PSL.

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Reflections on Europe: Karl Josef Hahn, W³adys³aw Bartoszewski, Erhard Busek Karl Josef Hahn, a Christian democrat pioneer of German-Czech descent, opponent of Hitler and Mussolini, and naturalised Dutchman, wrote the following (abridged) text on the eve of the demise of the Italian Christian Democracy party (DC), which had dominated Italian politics, and had a big influence on Italy itself as well as on European unification, for several decades after 1945. Although Hahn’s text points beyond Italy, showing as it does the potential hurdles at which Christian Democratic politics can fall. Hahn worked at Christian Democrat International headquarters in Rome from 1961.

Ascent or decline? – Considerations on the future of Christian Democracy in Free Europe (8 December 1961 – “Rheinischer Merkur”)

By Karl Josef Hahn in Rome Nowadays, it is worth considering the path that lies ahead for Europe’s Christian parties: what prospects are open to them, and what dangers they face. The signs and discernible prospects are – as so often in politics – contradictory. On the one hand, one cannot deny that Christian Democracy plays a vital role in present-day Europe. Almost half of all the delegates to the European Parliament are members of the Christian Democratic group.

And its leading position has been relatively unthreatened since the end of the Second World War. On the other hand, one can recognise symptoms that no longer leave room for self-satisfaction and self-assurance: namely, the impetus that carried Christian Democracy to its heights and into “its” governments seems to be flagging. Even committed supporters and friends of Christian Democracy are today finding it hard to distinguish safeguarded positions of power from immobility. Some countries, e.g. Belgium and West Germany, are experiencing some fluctuation and a slightly downward trend. Should we therefore be worried about the future?

Or can we no longer give in to the comforting feeling that fifteen years of Christian Democratic rule, unbroken in some countries, has not resulted in any particular wear and tear, and that even after the recent elections in Germany, and in particular those in England, Holland, Belgium and 191

Austria, Europe’s socialists have scarcely yet been able to break out of their secondary positions?

If we are today to consider the future of Christian Democracy in Europe, it is not for intellectual sport or out of a naïve pleasure in political horoscopes, but out of political insight into the fact that we are being faced with new and difficult questions. These questions have always been around, but they are more important today than ten years ago.

Let us start by considering history. Should we not try to work out exactly what has been responsible for the marvellous boom in Christian Democracy since the Second World War? Are we able to recognise whether these criteria for victory still exist today, let alone whether they will still exist tomorrow? The specific form of Christian Democracy that we are talking about today is in essence only a more developed form of the politics practised by those Christian parties that emerged before European totalitarianism (i.e. before 1918). Pope Leo XIII saw Christian Democracy as nothing more than a social movement that (only) concerned itself with the problems of workers. Today, Christian Democracy has become a comprehensive political movement that only took on its current form after the Second World War, as represented by parties that developed into widespread “popular parties”.

In Germany, Protestants and Catholics did not start cooperating closely and from a position of inner conviction until after the war. It was no longer just Catholic minorities within the population that benefited from the slogan “Christian Democratic”, but a decisive proportion of the entire electorate in eight countries of free continental Europe (the six plus Austria and Switzerland).

Christian Democracy came to be a representative political movement for a large part of Europe, one reason for this being the experience of totalitarian systems during the war, which moved people on both sides of the political spectrum to base their political activity on secure ethical and spiritual foundations. One consequence was an influx of completely new supporters, some of whom came without a doubt from traditional liberal, conservative and even extremist camps. All of these people wanted a return to more firmly established foundations. Even “traditional” materialistic Marxism had become outdated, as far as they were concerned.

The theory of the “historical impulse towards the class struggle” collapsed, and was replaced by a call for solidarity between social groups, as defined

by Christian politics.

In the years after 1945, Christian Democracy came to be defined by strong, Christian-oriented personalities with political experience and European ways of thinking. The policies of the various Christian Democratic parties and groups all had a commitment to European cooperation, a categorical rejection of communism, and support for unity in the free world in common. Even today, this has historical significance.

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Now, however, many of the reasons for the initial growth no longer apply. The French Popular Republican Movement (MRP) in particular has lost its appeal. People began to be less affected by the experiences of the war, and a strong tension between left and right returned. For many people, their standard of living became more important than their worldview.

“Marginal voters”, who had occasionally voted for the MRP, began to exert pressure and make demands. The party’s spiritual emphasis became weaker, and it shrank as a result. Yet firm cultural and educational policy remained a point of conflict. The “neighbours” of Christian parties – liberals, socialists and conservatives – were intensifying their concern with socio-political matters, property ownership policy and legal policy, and yet still sought at the same time to tap into the potential “Christian” voting public. This was often successful, because links to churches, unions and the social environment were becoming slacker. At the same time, pressure groups were gaining in clout. This reduces the influence of worldview groups as policy champions.

Political success (elections!) and the necessity to maintain and repeat it led to a weakening of all worldview emphases right across the original six-member Common Market, with the exception of Luxembourg. Outside the six, the ÖVP and Austria also lost many Christian voters, in particular traditional voters, through secularisation. The generation of 1945 experienced this development, and continues to experience it, with feelings of unease and powerlessness.

Now, politico-cultural topics are once again becoming the focus of attention. Christian Democrats need to recognise that fighting the process of progressive ideological dilution needs to be one of their most important duties, if not their main political cause in the future – in general, but also in their own interest, because otherwise Christian Democracy will lose its profile and its meaning. I repeat: we must re-evaluate the distinctive nature and the purpose of Christian Democracy, and learn to articulate it better. Unfortunately, there has not been enough manpower and time available for this in recent years.

Have the Christian Democrats really succeeded in creating truly modern popular parties, with progressive programmes and a solid party structure? As far as fundamental principles are concerned, they have succeeded, and this is what constitutes their particular value and their particular contribution as compared with socialism and liberalism. Nevertheless, they clearly suffer from many structural weaknesses. All too often, the so-called “bourgeois core”, which once resembled a party in itself, is predominant in any new cooperation between social groups. Although this often guarantees Christian parties a healthy level of stability, and safeguards them from being sucked into extreme political objectives, being in the “centre” (as people like to call it) cannot and should not lead to mediocrity and sedateness. The “popular party” concept should never mean dispensing 193

with attempts to integrate all social groups and classes. Have the Christian Democrats succeeded in making this credible, in practising convincing social politics in Europe, and – of no less importance – in explaining this to workers?

Has the Christian Social movement, launched from within the Church in the 19th century, really been fully accepted into and implemented within Christian Democracy since 1945? Is it not the case that the demand for private property via wealth creation means an increasing lack of respect for people from economically weak groups? Do some people sneak a glance at the Conservatives, in particular the British Conservatives? In short, the Christian Democrats have developed a very constructive social policy since 1945, but they have made too few inroads into traditionally Socialist and other left-wing working masses.

The “negative variety” within Christian Democratic parties also poses another threat. With more voters came more groups, regions played more of a role, so organisation and unity suffered. (This development destroyed Democrazia Cristiana in Italy, at a time after this Hahn publication). In Italy, numerous “correnti” (currents) emerged in the DC, which shook the party’s foundations. It has ceased to be representative of the population, which becomes evident at election time. The disintegration of the DC is worrying for the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in Germany, and is also a cause for concern – although less obviously – for all the leaders of Christian parties in the Benelux countries.

W³adys³aw Bartoszewski Cultural diversity versus cultural unity in Europe Prof. Dr W³adys³aw Bartoszewski (born 19 February 1922 in Warsaw), Polish historian and politician. Active in the anti-German resistance during the Second World War, an activist in the Konrad ¯egota Committee, which saved around 75,000 Jews. 1940/1941 – imprisoned in Auschwitz.

After 1945, resistance against communism, another six years in jail. 1980 – active in Solidarity. 1981 – temporarily imprisoned. Honorary Israeli citizen. Visiting professor in Munich, Eichstätt and Augsburg. Between 1990 and 1995, Polish ambassador in Vienna; 1995 – Foreign Minister; between 2000 and 2001, Foreign Minister again. Since 2007, permanent secretary and advisor to Prime Minister Donald Tusk. Focus areas: Germany, Israel, USA. Decorations: Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany; Adam Mickiewicz Award for Services to German-French-Polish Cooperation; Commander of the French Legion of Honour, amongst others.

The abridged article below appeared in the Berlin tageszeitung on 2 April 1988 – before the fall of the Berlin Wall.

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To begin, it seems to me necessary to clarify the concepts of cultural diversity and cultural unity a little, and also to consider what we understand by the concept of Europe. What can and may be and remain diverse, and what must be accepted as basic common denominators? Surely the position of individual human beings in society, i.e. the role of the individual in culture.

In some Western countries, Europe is understood to mean the political and economic community that lies west of the Elbe, plus a few neutral states such as Switzerland, Austria and Sweden. Geographically speaking, however, Europe is an Asian peninsula approximately 10 million square kilometres in size (if the European part of Russia is included), which is home to over 500 million people. There is an artificial and arbitrary political dividing line that runs right through Europe, along the Elbe, the purpose of which is to isolate people who are forced to live in different state systems. It separates present-day Europe into Western and Eastern Europe, allowing Central Europe, which has existed for centuries, to fade into near obscurity.

Those who live in Budapest and Prague, Warsaw and Kraków, Leipzig and Dresden do not have fewer rights than those who live in Vienna, Munich or Paris, namely to consider themselves co-heirs of the pan-European tradition. As Christians and people living in that part of Europe that has been sorely tested by the two world wars, we are thus obliged to overcome this dividing line in any way possible, and to reduce the consequences of separation, within the realms of possibility.

As Richard von Weizsäcker said recently on the occasion of a visit by François Mitterand, Europe’s borders should not be moved, they should be made more humane. What matters, he said, is strengthening historical, cultural and human common ground right across Europe. This opinion confirms my above assertions about the minimum area of common ground Europeans share.

Particularly representative of the Europe of the 1930s were England and France, the major centres of Western culture, strongholds of democracy, humanism and humanity. At that time, these societies had not yet forgotten how the First World War, which had taken place less than fifteen years earlier, had changed the political landscape of Europe: all of a sudden, there were small and medium-sized states that wanted to retain their own state sovereignty, independence, and cultural and domestic norms, appearing on the map.

The biggest of these states was Poland, but there were also Hungary, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Finland, and the Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in the eastern half of the continent. All of these countries wanted peace, political and economic stabilisation, the resolution of many domestic problems in the long-drawn-out process of nurturing new societies in new free and democratic states, but also cultural and scientific 195

cooperation. It is well known that the Second World War destroyed these fledgling developments in the most painful way.

The shared culture, art and thought of Europe should and will outlast any differences in political, economic and social systems in the future. No dividing line or political separation can abolish the deep-rooted hierarchy of values that has been shared by the countries of Europe for centuries.

Which values, then, are so characteristic of this shared activity and shared life? First of all, there are concepts that shape the roles of people in society, in the state and to a certain extent in history. For example, are human beings tools of the state, the property of rulers? Or are they simply men and women, peacefully disposed because they are free? For without freedom, there can be no opportunity to keep the peace!

An interesting example of the shared hierarchy of values, which exists in Europe despite different philosophical, economic and political systems, is the fact that in 1978, the cardinals of the Catholic Church elected a Pole to the position of spiritual leader, a citizen of the People’s Republic of Poland, who lived under Nazi domination for five years when he was in his early twenties, and then 33 years under the system of so-called real socialism, and who was ordained a priest under this system. It is clear that the interlinking shared hierarchy of European values played a key role in the Church’s choice.

For entire generations, many people in Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries made sacrifices and suffered in the firm belief that the meaning of life was tied up in the spiritual hierarchy of values, and that it was worth striving for a world of freedom and dignity for all. In 1945, people believed – perhaps too naively – that humanity had come to its senses and that the fate of people and nations would never again be decided by the superiority of weapons.

We know from Christian teaching that peace is inextricably linked to the freedom of the individual. It was certainly no coincidence that, when he visited the former Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1979, Pope John Paul II said in his homily: “One people can never develop at the expense of another – for the price of its exploitation and enslavement, at the cost of its exploitation and death.”

The fundamental idea behind this is that there can be no true peace without human freedom, respect for human dignity, and the practical recognition and realisation of human rights, which includes opportunities for cultural development. Of course, human freedom means freedom from hunger, but it also means freedom from fear, for fear – one of the saddest symptoms of our age – has often proved the best way of oppressing human beings.

Fear creates aggression, which in turn creates feelings of fear. Alongside freedom of speech and expression, freedom of worship and freedom from want, freedom from fear is one of the so-called “Four Freedoms” 196

expressed in the Atlantic Charter, the policy statement drafted in April 1941 that defined the Allied goals for the post-war world. At the time, hundreds of millions of people in Europe, America and elsewhere waited with naïve yet humanly justified hope for these principles to be implemented.

In the meantime, the Wannsee Conference had taken place, six million Jews had been killed, and further millions of Christians of different nationalities on both sides of the frontlines had become victims of the meaningless war and of inhumanity. With that in mind, one can imagine how much courage it must have taken to believe in the possibility of profound human change in Europe. But there was and still is no alternative.

This transformation of the human mentality was to be accompanied by the development of a concept of peace, of which human rights in free societies were an inherent component. When we in the West witness signs of solidarity with the nations of the Eastern Bloc, even when these signs are only sporadic and limited, we can be sure that mutual understanding is possible.

The experience of everyday spirituality on the Oder will undoubtedly differ from that on the Vistula, or the Danube. But would we consider it unusual, even exotic or radical?

Do we consider it a part of our shared contemporary culture? The next question is: what do human rights mean for the cultural unity of Europe?

Do we only see human rights as a humanitarian problem that affects individual people who are being persecuted – which is also important – or do we take a more fundamental view, seeing human rights as goals shaped by European Christian culture that will finally be voiced in the “second Europe”? Have the Hungarian, Czech and Polish battles – in 1956, 1968, 1970, 1976 and 1980/1981 – changed the way in which human rights are viewed? Have the Czech initiative Charter 77, the self-administered union “Solidarity”, or the Nobel prizes awarded to Sacharow or Wa³êsa had a concrete effect on Europe’s problems?

Without an answer to this question, there can be no politics focused on the prospect of a common and whole Europe. There is also some European common ground in practice outside the Western European community, namely shared ways of thinking, culture and art. This is therefore bound to outlive the differences of present-day political, economic and social systems.

This depends solely on us, i.e. on people who live under authoritarian systems, because no political dividing line or division can destroy this deeply rooted shared hierarchy of values, if the population of a country or a group of countries recognises and strives for this common ground.

Speaking on the occasion of his pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela on 9 November 1982, the Pope said: “In spite of bloody conflicts between the nations of Europe, and in spite of the spiritual crises that have shaken 197

the life of the continents – up to the serious questions that will be asked of the conscience of our time in the future – we have to admit that, after two millennia of its history, the European identity cannot be understood without Christianity, that this is where our common roots lie, out of which the continent’s civilisation has grown, namely its culture, its dynamic, its spirit of enterprise, its ability to expand constructively into other continents, in short everything for which it is renowned.”

In this context, i.e. of a shared European hierarchy of values understood in this way, a smaller, weaker nation can also play a significant spiritual role. The Europe of tomorrow must therefore comprise a community made up of smaller and larger free peoples and states. Intellectual cooperation, i.e. cultural and scientific cooperation, will be vital, but so will economic cooperation. What we really need is a type of European patriotism. In the first place, this means ties to the intellectual and cultural tradition of one’s own people, in the second place a deeper understanding of neighbouring nations and in the third place feelings of cultural identity shared with the whole of humanity.

This also means we still have a long way ahead of us towards deeper and mature European patriotism. Yet at the end of his address in Santiago de Compostela, John Paul II said: “When Europe is one, and manages to achieve this in spite of all its respective differences, including the different political systems, when European society once again thinks with the power expressed in declarations of principle such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights or the Helsinki Final Act, then its future will no longer be controlled by uncertainty and fear, and it will enter an era of new life which will bless the whole world.”

My difficult experiences of being a European have convinced me that people are forced to adapt to present realities. But there is no power that can make us betray our own history, our real convictions and our conscience.

Pure pacifism, for example, encourages dictators around the world to attack other countries and enslave people. I therefore believe that, although it comes at a price, the method that has developed in various countries around the world, including my homeland of Poland, in recent years, namely of providing non-violent resistance to despotism, guarantees human dignity to those acting in a non-violent way. They do not carry out terrorist attacks. They do not preach hatred. They are preaching love and a readiness for dialogue; they are always awaiting signs of goodwill from the opposite side.

Does that make sense? If you only look at our recent history, say the last five or ten years, it does not make much sense. But if you consider history as the logical development of human beings, it does make sense.

For back when the Christians were being persecuted under Nero, who

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would have thought that Christian truth would destroy all but a few archaeological remains and sculptures to bear witness to Roman paganism?

It was the history of mankind, and that is where our roots are to be found. The international solidarity of workers has already become insignificant in Western Europe today. We expect a lot more, namely international solidarity among human beings in the spirit of correctly interpreted humanism. Because what is at stake is a completely new type of solidarity among human beings, based on shared obligations. Millions of people of good will fight for such ideals in countries around the world, and they are now goals for coming generations: they will no longer be aiming to solve just temporary economic or social problems.

Europeans are undergoing huge changes in the way they think. Interpret this optimistically, and you may come to the conclusion that such changes will continue to be possible among human beings. And if such changes have clearly become possible, we ought – and will be able – to play an active part in influencing them and ensuring they continue.

Erhard Busek Vienna-born Erhard Busek is one of the great bridge-builders, not just between his country, the Republic of Austria, and Poland, but between West and East in nearly all of Europe. Born in 1941, he joined the Catholic youth movement Katholische Jugend Österreich at an early age, and has a doctorate in law. He became a city councillor in Vienna in 1976, and was later appointed deputy mayor. He went on to be involved in national politics, and became chairman of the ÖVP, science minister, and vice chancellor.

For a time, he was involved in the CSCE process. After successful political coordination in the Balkans after 1996, Busek became head of the Viennabased Institute for the Danube Region and Central Europe. The following texts are taken from his book Mitteleuropa (Central Europe) (1997), which introduces his Polish friends Mazowiecki, Bartoszewski, Wa³êsa, Tischner and Ko³akowski, amongst others.

The sluggish West – The West was not prepared (for the fall of communism), and has still failed to react appropriately today, either to the economic or the social and political problems. It is amazing that, although many in the West longed for the collapse of the Soviet Empire in rhetorical terms (Ronald Reagan: “the evil empire”), there is still no acceptable term to describe today’s multivariable landscape. It would appear that bipolar situations are easier to assimilate.

This phase in Central and Eastern Europe has been marked primarily by personalities who did not come from the world of politics, and who have since returned whence they came, either voluntarily or through be-

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ing voted out. The complex structure of these regions has become visible again: minority group problems and historical boundaries are just as responsible for the catalogue of problems as historical myths and antiquated shows of force.

The fall of the Iron Curtain highlighted cultural differences. In the event of confrontation based on mutual misunderstanding, these could trigger continental, even global conflicts. Listening to the Slavic, Orthodox and Islamic worlds has become a challenge of our time.

The question of whether Europe exists at all was made negotiable by the facts of 1989, when the question of integrating the continent was polarised by power struggles of all kinds. Europeans may also end up either isolated or in a state of permanent self-containment.

The failure of the left – It is also beyond doubt that Social Democrats in particular hoped communism would somehow turn into a type of Social Democracy. Kreisky, Brandt and Palme in particular were under this illusion for a time, as were “their” dissidents. Most of these became media darlings, e.g. Rudolf Bahro, Wolf Biermann and other GDR writers, Jifi Pelikán, Pavel Kohout and Zdenek Mlynar, who at least succeeded in becoming a university professor in Austria.

During one of Mazowiecki’s visits to Vienna, he met not only with Christian unions in the later reform countries – the creation of their own union movement, which was recently discredited as an idea by labour organisations faithful to the regime, was difficult – but also with Austrian Social Democratic union president Fritz Verzetnitsch. I met Mazowiecki afterwards, and he was really depressed. He asked me whether the ÖGB (Austrian Trade Union Federation) really wanted democracy and freedom in the region at all, as they only accepted those unions officially recognised by the communist government in Poland. Mazowiecki said that at times like that, he had the feeling that the Solidarity movement was being left in the lurch.

Especially for Christians – Participation in Europe requires that we activate our European heritage, in all its ambivalence, with all its achievements and catastrophes; after all, we have played a part both in the construction and in the self-destruction of this continent. At this point, I will venture a small digression aimed at Christians in particular. We know that Europe was shaped by Christianity for centuries. However, the fact that the conciliatory Europe was also shaped by Christians has been forgotten today: it was Konrad Adenauer, Robert Schuman and Alcide De Gasperi who, from the rubble of post-war Europe, pointed the way to a Christian understanding of history and the world. To this day, religion has always been the binding element. The painful process of secularisation may be responsible for today’s general lack of recognition of religion. Christians 200

should not retreat in the face of this, but must try to build a new network of relationships, with the help of culture and a cultural life based on the values of the Gospel and a Christian worldview. Familiar concepts such as charity, tolerance and humanity can be used to help with this development. Teilhard de Chardin spoke of “hominisation”, of incarnation, as a cultural responsibility. This is in the spiritual vicinity of humanisation, which is one of the objectives of other post-Enlightenment currents of thought.

Return rather than the end of history – Francis Fukuyama talked about the end of history, but we are experiencing the return of history, because no part of Europe is comprehensible without history. We find ourselves thrown into a simultaneity of events. The world of information conveys knowledge to us of all worldwide events, and yet we are forced to recognise that it is not a new form of nationalism, but the old, ugly form, that is thawing again after the communist frost, and is flexing its muscles in Eastern Europe, time delayed compared with the West. Nevertheless, there does not need to be a “clash of civilisations”, as Sam Huntington predicted. It is possible for the different cultures of the world to come together, particularly if we know who we ourselves are. For this, we need to know about our own history, about those myths and tales that are parables for life. The older generation has to be reproached for failing to pass on enough storie and history. We know too little of the tales that have made our Europe.

Only when the British say “our Kraków” – In Europe, Hamlet broods over the secret of his inaction, and Faust wants to escape his agonising brooding by means of action; in Europe, Don Juan looks for the perfect woman in every woman he meets, but never finds her, and Don Quixote tears through a European country with his lance at the ready, trying to wrest a higher existence from reality. But this Europe, where Newton and Leibniz measured the infinitesimal and the infinitely large, where our cathedrals, as Alfred de Musset said, kneel praying in their stone vestments, where the silver ribbon of rivers links one town to the next, which carve the work of time in the crystal of space … this Europe has yet to arise.

Only when the Spanish speak of “our Chartres”, the British “our Kraków”, the Italians “our Copenhagen” and the Germans “our Bruges” will it be apparent. Only when this has been achieved will we know for certain that the spirit that guides our actions has spoken the creative word: FIAT EUROPE!

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Poland on the EPP agenda – a few key facts The chronicle Voyage to the Heart of Europe, edited by Pascal Fontaine and published by Racine, contains the history of the EPP Group until 2009. This book touches on the subject of Poland, featuring a few selected examples. It does not document the experiences of the “Polish delegation” of the European Parliament, which visited Poland on many occasions, not only in the run-up to Poland joining the EU. Understandably, since this would be enough to fill a book on its own! The delegation put forward Polish affairs correspondents who informed the various national groups witin the EPP Group about Poland. In other words, Poland is just one subject among many in P. Fontaine’s 750-page book. For a while, weekly reports on Poland were given in Brussels and Strasbourg, not always to the Group plenary sessions.

1956. The Group and 1968 the EUCD discuss the situation in Hungary after the uprising in October 1956.

1975. The Group is repeatedly involved with the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE), and again calls for human rights in Eastern and Central Eastern Europe.

1980. The Group expresses solidarity with Poland on several occasions, and calls on Poland’s neighbours to respect Polish democracy.

1981. After the declaration of martial law in Poland, the Party and the Group condemn military rule, call for western aid, and demand that Lech Wa³êsa and other Polish democrats be released.

1987. Egon Klepsch and the Group presidency visit Moscow.

1988. The Group bureau meets representatives of the Polish opposition in Warsaw, Gdañsk and Lublin.

1988. Pope John Paul II addresses the European Parliament and meets with EPP Group chairman Egon Klepsch.

1990. The first Polish guests are welcomed at the EPP confernce in Dublin. The Robert Schuman Foundation launches its first political seminars in southern Poland. The stagiaire programme begins.

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1990. In Berlin, the EPP Secretary General presents the Group with a list of parties in Central and Eastern Europe that are being considered as partners and with whom negotiations are on-going.

1993. Ria Oomen-Ruijten and other East experts call for more funds for the aid programme aimed at helping refugees from the countries of the former Yugoslavia.

1994. Egon Klepsch, who is now parliamntary president, pays an official visit to the Polish parliament.

2002 – 2003. Elmar Brok and other delegates work closely with the Polish Sejm delegation at the “Convention”.

2004. On 1 May, Polish politicians close to the Group join it as “observers”.

2007. Joseph Daul, new (French) Group chairman, calls for more support for parties that are friends of the Group in former communist states like Poland.

2008. The EPP Group supports Prof. Dr Jerzy Buzek’s candidacy to become parliamentary president.

Relations between the EPP and the EPP Group and Polish governments 1989 – 2010 Tadeusz Mazowiecki government (Freedom Union, UW) 1989 – 1990 Continuation of Church and Solidarity contacts Jan Bielecki government (Liberals, KLD) 1990 – 1991 Campaign for a centre alliance, relaxation of relations with the UW Jan Olszewski government (Solidarity deputy, Centre Agreement) 1991 – 1992 Initial political support for Centre Agreement Waldemar Pawlak short-term government (PSL) 1992 No relations Hanna Suchocka government (UW) 1992 – 1993 New efforts with the Freedom Union and scattered small parties

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Waldemar Pawlak government (PSL) 1993 – 1995 Governed with SLD. Contacts with the left, in particular with Aleksander Kwaœniewski.

Jozef Oleksy government (SLD) 1995 – 1996 Direct contacts with Oleksy, intensification of contacts with the UW and others Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz government (SLD) 1996 – 1997 No contacts JerzyBuzek government (AWS) 1997 – 2001 Numerous contacts with the parties in the Buzek coalition, which suffered a total defeat in 2001 Leszek Miller government (SLD) 2001 – 2004 (resignation on Poland’s accession to the EU) Working contacts via politicians such as Kwaœniewski and Oleksy (who led the Convention delegation for a time) Marek Belka government – interlude with SLD No contacts Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz government (PiS) 2005 – 2007 Final break with PiS politicians after their departure from the EPP Group, improved relations with the PSL. Support for the groups that set up the Civic Platform (PO).

Donald Tusk government (PO) from 2007 Support for partner parties since foundation, close cooperation in the EU.

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Index of names Adenauer, Konrad 9, 15, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 49, 53, 64, 136, 157, 163, 165, 166, 200 Alber, Siegbert 55, 85, 149, 150 Aposto³, Marian 85 Arbatov, Georgii 52 Auleytner, Wac³aw 153 Bahr, Egon 52, 64, 157, 158, 159 Bahro, Rudolf 200 Balcerowicz, Leszek 78, 112, 133 Bank, Erhard von der 188 Barañczak, Jaros³aw 96 Barbi, Paolo 174, 185 Barczik, Karol 114 Bartoszewski, W³adys³aw 88, 190, 191, 194, 199 Barzel, Rainer 155 Battersby, Robert 55, 83, 84, 85 Bech, Josef 38, 165 Beckel, Albrecht 44, 149 Bender, Iwo 105 Bender, Ryszard 67, 82, 105 Bernassola, Angelo 109, 151 Bevin, Ernest 37 Bidault, Georges 165 Bielan, Adam 105, 108, 135 Biermann, Wolf 200 Biller, Stephen 85, 188 Bismarck, Philipp von 93 Blachnicki, Franciszek 121 Blum, Léon 39 Bonetti, Andrea 184 Bordry, Pierre 152 Brandt, Willy 27, 43, 50, 52, 59, 73, 74, 75, 93, 157, 158, 159, 166, 169, 200 Brandys, Kazimierz 85 Brentano, Heinrich von 44 Briand, Aristide 37 Brok, Elmar 113, 124, 125, 142, 203 Brouwer, Alain De 149

Budnik, Rafa³ 182, 189, 190 Bujak, Zbigniew 89 Bukmans, Piet 174 Busek, Erhard 63, 117, 121, 126, 191, 199 Bush, George W. 89, 106, 142 Butkus, Viktoras 148 Buttiglione, Rocco 121, 186, 187 Buzek, Jerzy 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 72, 104, 109, 128, 130, 132, 143, 204 Capel, Arthur 37 Casaroli, Agostini 75 Chantérie, Raf 125 Chardin, Teilhard de 201 Chrzanowski, Zbigniew 135 Churchill, Winston 17, 38, 39, 84, 164 Clement, Wolfgang 158 Cock, Pat 133 Colin, André 165 Colombo, Emilio 126, 185 Croce, Benedetto 37 Croux, Lambert 51, 68 Czaja, Herbert 74 Czaputowicz, Jacek 63, 64 Czyrek, Józef 66, 147 Daul, Joseph 7, 12, 174, 185, 203 D¹browski, Jerzy 57, 87, 88, 113 Debatisse, Michel 51, 52, 60 Delors, Jacques 72 Dmowski, Roman 20, 21, 114 Domin, Czes³aw 85 Dönhoff, Marion 64 Döpfner, Julius 41, 73 Dorn, Ludwik 105 Drozdek, Zygmunt 124, 129, 147, 148, 152 Dulles, John Foster 39 Estgen, Nicolas 185

205

Fedak, Paulina 69 Ferrer, Concepció 35, 184 Fitzgerald, Garret 174 Forlani, Arnaldo 168 Formigoni, Roberto 56, 65 Frasyniuk, W³adys³aw 87, 134 Freudenstein, Roland 45 Frings, Josef 41 Gahler, Michael 185 Gál, Kinga 185 Galazewski, Andrzej 135 Gasperi, Alcide De 9, 15, 39, 116, 165, 200 Gaulle, Charles de 14, 15, 53, 106, 115, 167, 168, 169, 171 Gawronski, Jas 85 Gebhardt, Stanis³aw 82, 150 Genscher, Hans-Dietrich 59 Geremek, Bronis³aw 61, 70, 78, 87, 88, 90, 122, 124, 133, 134, 136, 152, 165 Giavazzi, Giovanni 51, 56 Giscard d’Estaing, Valéry 69, 170, 178 Glemp, Józef 58, 63, 67, 71, 85, 99, 153 Globke, Hans 41 Golubiew, Antoni 32 Gonzales, Felipe 166 Gorbachev, Mikhail 25, 26, 27, 45, 46, 51, 52, 151 Gosiewski, Przemys³aw 105 Grzyb, Andrzej 135 Guccione, Sergio 51 Gumbrycht, Zbigniew 62 Gwizdz, Wies³aw 152 Habsburg, Otto von 137 Hahn, Karl Josef 48, 49, 50, 169, 191 Hall, Aleksander 89, 114, 115, 127 Harriman, Averell 38 Hassel, Kai-Uwe von 168 Heck, Bruno 67 Heller, Edith 44 Hitler, Adolf 14, 21, 38, 48, 111, 142, 166, 186, 191

206

Holland, Agnieszka 85 Hölvényi, György 180, 185 Hurdes, Felix 165 Isturiz, Antonio Lopez 187 Jansen, Thomas 54, 58, 101, 103, 151, 153 Jaruzelski, Wojciech 27, 46, 54, 61, 64, 123, 151, 155, 158, 159 Jaspar, Marcel-Henri 38 John Paul II 16, 17, 28, 29, 125, 146, 156, 180, 187, 188, 189, 196, 198, 202 Juncker, Jean-Claude 36 Jurek, Marek 82, 105 Kaczyñski, Jaros³aw 20, 67, 70, 88, 92, 101, 102, 103, 104-107, 128, 141 Kaczyñski, Lech 6, 88, 104, 105, 107 Kaden-Bandrowski, Julius 20 Kamiñski, Mariusz 105 Kamiñski, Micha³ 135 Kamiñski, Tadeusz 96 Karas, Othmar 185, 188 Kasoulides, Ioannis 185 Kelam, Tunne 185 Kerstens, Pieter 38 Kisielewski, Stefan 32, 147 Kissinger, Henry 27, 94 Klepsch, Egon 23, 26, 27, 51, 52, 53, 55, 58, 59, 60, 64-72, 76, 84, 87, 101, 126, 137, 140, 151, 152, 170, 174, 179, 181, 184, 202, 203 Klich, Bogdan 135 Klisiewicz, Wies³aw 96 Knysok, Anna 96 Kohl, Helmut 14, 27, 36, 53, 64, 67, 69, 72, 75, 80, 89, 91, 93, 94, 101, 121, 126, 139, 174, 186, 188 Kohout, Pavel 200 Komorowski, Bronis³aw 190 Kondziela, Joachim 66, 67 König, Fritz 119 Köppler, Heinrich 74 Korfanty, Wojciech 20, 22

Kostarczyk, Andrzej 55, 56, 58, 69, 71, 101, 103, 113, 136, 140 Kowalska, Wac³awa 150 Koz³owski, Jan 68, 139, 140 Krasicki, Ignacy 153 Kreisky, Bruno 157, 200 Kremer, Christian 107 Król, Marcin 114 Krzaklewski, Marian 128 Krzemiñski, Adam 19, 20, 128 Ku³akowski, Jan 36, 78, 86, 132 Küng, Hans 66 Kuratowska, Zofia 70 Kuroñ, Jacek 69, 114 Kwaœniewski, Aleksander 125, 134, 141, 204 Lambrias, Panayotis 51, 52, 54, 60, 65 Langes, Horst 179, 181, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 188 Lec, Jerzy 15 Lehmann, Karl 147 Lehmann, Reinhold 74, 76, 147 Lenz, Marlene 124 Leo XIII 14, 16, 192 Lepper, Andrzej 141 Lewandowski, Janusz 70, 103, 105, 135 Lipinski, Adam 105 Lissek, Vincens 76 Lorang, Walter 157 Lubbers, Ruud 126, 174 Lücke, Paul 44 Lücker, Hans-August 171, 172, 185 £¹czkowski, Pawe³ 95, 96 £êtowski, Marek 152 £opuszanski, Jan 82 Macharski, Franciszek 85 Macierewicz, Antoni 82 Maderiaga, Salvador 15 Maier, Hans 44 Maij-Weggen, Hanja 51, 52, 58, 60, 68, 185 Majman, S³awomir 106, 141

Malewska, Hanna 32 Malinowski, Roman 60, 138, 151 Marcinkiewicz, Kazimierz 105, 204 Martens, Wilfried 5, 107, 126, 172, 173, 174, 177, 178 Marx, Werner 31 Masaryk, Jan 38 Mauro, Mario 185, 188 Mazowiecki, Tadeusz 5, 34, 61, 63, 69, 70, 71, 78, 85, 87-89, 91, 94, 97, 98, 101, 103, 111, 115, 118, 120, 123, 124, 127, 128, 132, 133, 138-140, 142, 147, 151, 152, 154, 155, 156, 158, 190, 199, 200, 203 Mertes, Alois 31, 75 Micewski, Andrzej 147 Michnik, Adam 31, 56, 88, 90, 114, 142 Mihailova, Nadeshda 187 Miko³ajczyk, Stanis³aw 20, 22, 23, 138 Mi³osz, Czes³aw 12, 13 Miodowicz, Alfred 47 Mitsotakis, Konstantin 174 Mitterrand, Francois 27 Mlynar, Zdenek 200 Mock, Alois 119, 120 Moczar, Mieczys³aw 147 Mollet, Guy 39 Monnet, Jean 163, 173 Moras, Pawel 180 Morlion, Andrew 153 Mussolini, Benito 142, 161, 166, 191 Muszyñski, Henryk 141 Nowina-Konopka, Piotr 70, 91, 98 Olbrycht, Jan 185 Oleksy, Józef 69, 125, 204 Olszewski, Jan 104, 125, 126, 203 Oomen-Ruijten, Ria 185, 186, 187, 203 Oreja, Jaime Mayor 185 O’sváth, György 150 Palme, Olof 166, 200 Papini, Roberto 169

207

Paul VI 18 Pawlak, Waldemar 6, 24, 69, 71, 125, 127, 138, 190, 203, 204 Paw³owski, Krzysztof 83, 94, 95, 96 Pelikán, Jifi 200 Peterle, Alojz 126, 185 Pflimlin, Pierre 185 Piccoli, Flaminio 54, 151 Pieronek, Tadeusz 187, 189 Pi³ka, Marian 82, 108 Pi³sudski, Józef 19, 20, 21, 22, 117, 139, 142 Pipka, Hubert 38 Pires, Francisco Lucas 185 Poher, Alain 168, 171 Polarczek, Jerzy 105 Popiel, Karol 22, 82 Popie³uszko, Jerzy 58, 59, 63, 119, 151, 159 Potocki, Andrzej 124 Pöttering, Hans-Gert 173, 174 Prall, Kalli 157 Prodi, Romano 36 Rakowski, Mieczys³aw 55, 56, 64, 65, 94, 153 Rangel, Paulo 185 Reagan, Ronald 199 Reiter, Janusz 57, 87, 114, 115 Retinger, Józef 37, 38, 39, 40, 164 Ricci, Francesco 121 Riegler, Josef 117, 119 Rokita, Jan Maria 46, 126, 128, 134 Rumor, Mariano 167, 171 Rydzyk, Tadeusz 78 Sagladin, Vadim 52 Santer, Jacques 4, 174, 185, 187, 188 Saryusz-Wolski, Jacek 59, 60, 132 Sassen, Emmanuel 165 Schmid, Carlo 42 Schmidt, Helmut 158 Schuman, Robert 4, 9, 10, 14, 15, 37, 38, 39, 41, 42, 52, 64, 81, 84, 85, 95, 96, 112, 116, 117, 118, 126, 130, 132, 133, 135, 141, 145,

208

153, 161, 162, 163, 180, 183, 184, 188, 199, 200 Seiters, Rudolf 188 Sieniewicz, Konrad 54, 82, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 154 Sikorski, W³adys³aw 23, 38, 164 Si³a-Nowicki, W³adys³aw 82, 103, 151 Skalnik, Kurt 118 Skibowski, Klaus Otto 40, 41, 42, 43, 44 Soyeur, Jules 165 Spaak, Paul-Henri 38, 40 Stalin, Joseph 14, 18, 20, 23, 26, 30, 38, 40, 42, 59, 63, 163 Stegerwald, Adam 163 Steinbach, Erika 107 Steinhoff, Janusz 95, 96 Stomma, Stanis³aw 31, 32, 33, 42, 43, 44, 56, 58, 67, 76, 78, 87, 103, 113, 114, 147, 148, 149, 151, 153, 154 Strauss, Franz Josef 44, 47, 73, 94 Sturzo, Luigi 16, 161, 162, 163, 164 Suchocka, Hanna 71, 125, 129, 187, 203 Szczypiorski, Andrzej 76, 140, 143 Szymanski, Stanis³aw 69 Œlisz, Józef 136, 137, 138, 139, 140 Teitgen, Henri 165 Thatcher, Margaret 50, 105, 113, 115, 175 Thun und Hohenstein, Ró¿a Gräfin von 98, 127, 186, 188 Tillich, Stanis³aw 34 Tindemans, Leo 59, 126, 152, 168, 173, 174 Tischner, Józef 199 Traxler, Gabrielle 158 Trotsky, Leon 66 Turowicz, Jerzy 32, 118 Tusk, Donald 6, 11, 22, 69, 72, 92, 133, 136, 138, 141, 190, 194, 204 Ujazdowski, Kazimierz 105

Urban, Jerzy 65 Velzen, Wim van 88, 103, 109, 115, 116, 125, 129, 132, 134, 143, 186 Verzetnitsch, Fritz 158, 200 Vogel, Bernhard 44, 148 Wahl, Jürgen 4, 6, 8, 31, 100, 181 Wa³êsa, Lech 5, 47, 58, 59, 63, 68, 83, 88, 90, 92, 102, 110, 123, 126, 137, 138, 140, 152, 158, 190, 197, 199, 202 Wassermann, Zbigniew 105 Weizsäcker, Richard von 31 Welle, Klaus 107, 127 Wilson, Henry 37 Wilson, Woodrow 22 Winiarska, Danuta 69 Witos, Wincenty 21, 137, 139 Wittbrodt, Edmund 135 WoŸniakowski, Jacek 32, 114 Wyszyñski, Stefan 16, 30, 40, 41, 42, 43, 61, 66, 76 Yakovlev, Alexander 27 Zab³ocki, Janusz 82, 147, 148, 150, 152 Zawiejski, Jerzy 32

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