Feature
People ask me questions about Katyn warily...
Historians are well informed about the huge amount of documents relating to the history of our two countries and the international problems in which Russia and Poland were involved. Our archives are in regular contact.Even such widely different agencies as Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) and Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) have jointly published several collections of documents. One of their recent projects concerned the Warsaw ghetto uprising.
But I think that archive policy must be overhauled. Countries may refer to national legislation, exceptions, archive traditions and the like, but there is no logical reason for keeping archive materials confidential 70 years after an event.
Archives cannot be expected to change their policy willingly, as there is an internal logic to their operation which can be overcome only by a political decision taken simultaneously by the heads of the world’s leading powers.