It was footprints left in the deep snow that assisted police in tracking down the perpetrators of the theft described below (BBC WEBSITE 06.01.10) from the museum about half an hour’s drive from Tychy:
“Polish police want to question two Swedes over the theft of the "Arbeit macht frei" metal sign from the Nazis' notorious Auschwitz death camp. Polish prosecutors say one is believed to be the mastermind behind the theft, while the other helped with logistics in the 18 December operation. The sign was later found by police cut into three pieces, and five Polish men were arrested in the country's north. Polish authorities have said the theft was ordered by a foreigner. "We have asked Sweden to confirm the personal data of two people we suspect of participating in this crime and we want to question a third person from Sweden as well, but this person has no direct link with the case," Prosecutor Artur Wrona told a Krakow press conference on Wednesday. There has been speculation in Swedish and British media that the theft was ordered by neo-Nazi sympathisers, but there was no confirmation of this from Mr Wrona. He said the next steps would depend on the Swedes, from whom Polish authorities earlier requested assistance in the case.”
What on earth the commissioners of such a crime were planning to do with the trophy is a mystery that one day may become apparent.
The legacy o the communist era still manifests from time to time in Poland as the following article from the New Poland Express (08.01.10) illustrates:
“As of the beginning of this year, approximately 40,000 ex-communist secret service agents have been forced to take a significant cut in their pensions. The new law, originally set up in March last year, will drastically hit out at the privileges that former communist functionaries had come to expect. Until January 1, members of the Military Council of National Salvation (the military dictatorship set up in December 1981 to administer Poland during martial law) could expect to take home as much as PLN 8,500 a month in pensions. That figure has now been slashed to a much more modest sum of around PLN 4,000. Amongst the many ex-service men to be affected by the new law is General Wojciech Jaruzelski, who, along with members of the National Salvation Council, helped to suppress and crush the Polish worker’s Solidarity movement almost 30 years ago. The controversial decision to alter the pension law comes after widespread anger that people like Jaruzelski and others who helped to prevent the democratic movement have been enjoying comfortable lives in their senior years. However, despite the large cuts, some are still not completely satisfied citing the fact that the new figure is still too excessive - given the fact that a retired doctor can expect as little as PLN 2,000 a month. In total, roughly 40,000 people were employed within the communist secret services until its eventual collapse in 1989. The severity of their pension cuts will depend on their rank when they eventually left their post and the length of time they served.”
As all of you will be aware, the attempted act of suicidal multiple-homicidal terrorism perpetrated on Christmas Day that revealed flaws in the intelligence gathering systems, as well as the inadequacy of screening at airports. The predictable knee-jerk response to the crotch-concealed but failed explosive device will involve further massive expense and disruption for travellers world-wide, possibly to little avail. I tend to agree with Stephen Murgatroyd’s blog on the topic:
“The attempt to detonate a bomb concealed in the underwear of a passenger on a flight to the US as it was passing through Canadian airspace has caused a new wave of security measures for flights into the US from world-wide destinations. Airport security staff now routinely pats down passengers and there is talk of the deployment of full body scanners. These measures are theatre – they would not have detected the explosives carried by the would-be bomber. The full body scanners will detect small metal objects, but will not detect plastics or liquids – the core components of the Christmas bomb. Patting a person down, particularly when it becomes a routine, is also unlikely to detect liquids in small quantities. The substance of the bomb was just three ounces of a dry powder distributed in the front of a pair of underpants. The “trigger” was a liquid held in a plastic syringe. The measures now in place show that the response to a threat is to increase the extent of theatre in the hope that the show of deterrence will be sufficient to deter terrorists. The evidence is that the terrorists just get smarter. Most security measures in place at airports are about appearances, not about the reality of preventing terrorism: the bomber passed through security at a major airport and was on a no-fly list”.
EU membership continues to bring potential benefits to Poles:
"Deutsche Bahn plans to open new rail lines to Poland’s largest business cities, including Warsaw, Gdynia, Katowice, Krakow and Poznan. Opening of the routes by the German railway company was made possible by new EU rules aimed at increasing competition in rail travel. Deutsche Bahn still needs to obtain licenses to operate in Poland, which it should have by March. This would allow it to begin offering service later in 2010. Industry analysts say that the entry of Deutsch Bahn onto the Polish market should lead to increased competition and a drop in ticket prices, as the two companies vie for customers." New Poland Express (08.01.10)
Friday, 8 January 2010
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