Statesmen gather for funeral of diplomat and WWII veteran Bartoszewski

It will be attended by the Presidents of Poland and Germany Bronisław Komorowski and Joachim Gauck, Prime Minister Ewa Kopacz, the Senate Speaker Bogdan Borusewicz and President of the European Council Donald Tusk, all of whom are to deliver their tributes to Bartoszewski after the service.

At 2.15 pm, he will be laid to rest at the city’s Powązki Cemetery in a ceremony which is expected to be attended by thousands of people, including former Israeli foreign minister Moshe Arens, many high-ranking politicians and members of the diplomatic corps.

Having been released from Auschwitz in April 1941 thanks to the efforts of the Polish Red Cross, which he had worked for before his arrest, Bartoszewski joined an anti-Nazi resistance unit devoted to saving Jews (Żegota) and fought in the 1944 Warsaw Rising.

After the war, when a Moscow-backed communist regime was imposed on Poland, he was active in the pro-democracy movement and spent seven years in prison on espionage charges.

After the imposition of martial law in December 1981 to crush the Solidarity movement, in which he was actively involved, he was interned by the communist regime.

After the collapse of communism, he served twice as Polish foreign minister. In 2007 he took up the post of the Prime Minister’s plenipotentiary for international dialogue, with a special responsibility for the development of Polish-German relations and contacts with the Jewish diaspora and Israel.

The Israeli Parliament, the Knesset, will hold a special session in tribute to Władysław Bartoszewski in the afternoon. An address by the Knesset Speaker Juli Edelstein will be followed by a debate. The Polish Ambassador to Israel has been invited to attend the session. Bartoszewski was an honorary citizen of Israel and held the Righteous among the Nations medal for saving Jews during World War Two. (mk/nh)