Compromise made over Madonna concert clash

Defaced posters in Warsaw. The 'PW' symbol stands for "Poland Fights", and was a common form of anti-German graffiti during the Nazi occupation: photo - PAP/Jacek Turczyk

The American singer's Polish concert falls on the 68th anniversary of the outbreak of the Warsaw Rising, the doomed insurgency against the Nazi German occupiers that left Poland's capital in ruins.

Veterans and Catholic groups have been protesting to both the event organisers, Live Nation, and the city of Warsaw, in an attempt to have the concert date changed.

That aim will not be met, but a two-and-a-half-minute film evoking the trauma of the Warsaw Rising will now be screened before Madonna takes the stage at the National Stadium on 1 August.

However, in spite of the compromise, further protests are not ruled out.

Posters advertising the concert across the capital have been daubed over with symbols once used by Polish patriots in riposte to the Nazi German occupiers.

It is not the first time that the American singer's touring schedule has caused controversy in Poland. In 2009, there were protests when it transpired that the Warsaw fixture in her “Sticky and Sweet” international tour clashed with the Feast of the Assumption of our Lady, an important pilgrimage date for many Poles.

Catholic groups have frequently criticised the singer's apparent mocking of Christian symbols, both in concerts and publicity pictures.

The Warsaw Rising was led by the official underground army that answered to the wartime Polish-government-in-exile in London.

Approximately 180,000 civilians died during the two-month ordeal, and much of what remained of the city was then dynamited on Hitler's orders. (nh)