Article in Polish on Russian ambitions

This article appeared in the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza
13 August 2009
Czasy imperiów skończyły się, Rosjo!

Zamiast pokazywać, że 56-latek może mieć duże mięśnie, Władimir Putin mógłby pokazać, jak wielki ma mózg i serce - porzucić nacjonalistyczną retorykę i dostrzec w sąsiadach przyszłych przyjaciół zamiast przeszłych wasali i potencjalnych wrogów - pisze Denis MacShane
1. Naszą uwagę pochłania irlandzkie referendum w sprawie traktatu lizbońskiego, tymczasem prawdziwe pytanie o Europę leży bez odpowiedzi tysiące kilometrów na wschód. W 1989 r. Rosja utraciła imperium, ale odnalazła się jako naród. Jaka jest rola Rosji i jej związek z resztą Europy i świata?W 1919 r. mały naród gruziński, z własnym językiem, kulturą i tożsamością liczącymi tysiące lat myślał, że ma przed sobą europejską przyszłość. Przywódcy europejskich socjalistów jak Brytyjczyk Ramsay MacDonald odwiedzali ten kraj albo pisali o nim w entuzjastycznym tonie jako o nowym przykładzie socjaldemokracji czarnomorskiej. Kres temu położył Stalin, sam Gruzin - Armia Czerwona wkroczyła do Gruzji i zdusiła jej niepodległość. W zeszłym roku inna armia rosyjska stanęła u gruzińskich granic. Gdy wzmogła się sporadyczna wymiana ognia w gruzińskim regionie Osetii Południowej Rosjanie dostali doskonały pretekst do inwazji drogą lądową, morską i powietrzną.20 tys. rosyjskich wojsk i 2 tys. czołgów wkroczyło do Gruzji. Kiedy doszli do Gori, 40 minut jazdy samochodem od stołecznego Tbilisi, na głównym placu miasta zobaczyli ogromny pomnik Stalina - Gori to miejsce urodzin tyrana. Wielu przeżegnało się na ten widok; nie wiadomo, czy był to gest religijnej czci, czy raczej sposób ochrony.2. Odtąd Moskwa głośno mówiła, że okupacja suwerennego terytorium państwa członkowskiego ONZ i Rady Europy była albo samoobroną przed wspieraną przez USA ingerencją w sprawy Rosji, albo - dla odmiany - uprawnionym wsparciem ludności Osetii Południowej, która nie chce być rządzona przez Tbilisi. Pogardę Moskwy dla tego skrawka Kaukazu dobrze ilustruje wyznaczenie rosyjskiego biznesmena na premiera Osetii.W sierpniu Rosja pokazała światu zdjęcia Władimira Putina prężącego tors. Gruzję niedawno odwiedził wiceprezydent USA Joe Biden. Ryzyko wybuchu ostrego konfliktu na Kaukazie w czasie pomiędzy okazaniem zatroskania przez Bidena a okazaniem muskułów przez Putina osłabło. Ale Rosja wciąż się upiera, że Gruzja podobnie jak Ukraina, kraje bałtyckie, Polska i inne części imperium sowieckiego są nadal w jej sferze wpływów.3. Europejska polityka Rosji jest jasna. Moskwa chce Europy oddzielnych krajów, z którymi będzie się dogadywać po kolei. Niemcy zostaną ozłocone lukratywnymi kontraktami energetycznymi i handlowymi. Francję się uwiedzie, pozwalając prezydentowi Sarkozy'emu na podpisanie "pokojowej" umowy z Rosją, którą Rosja zdążyła już na wiele sposobów naruszyć. Wielka Brytania uważana za zbyt bliską Waszyngtonowi będzie trzymana na dystans poprzez uniemożliwienie działalności firm brytyjskich w Rosji, zamknięcie ośrodka British Council i wstrętne aluzje, że przodkowie jej ministra spraw zagranicznych Davida Milibanda pochodzili z polskich Żydów.Niestety, niezdolność Europy do rozmawiania z Rosją jednym głosem oraz do udzielenia jasnego poparcia politycznego Gruzji i Ukrainie, pomimo zawirowań politycznych w tych krajach, to oddawanie pola Moskwie. Wyczuwając słabość Europy, Rosja niemal wykastrowała OBWE, biorąc odwet na instytucji, która od swojego powstania w latach 70. pomagała komunistycznym regionom Europy w pokojowym przejściu do demokracji.W lipcu wielu wybitnych polityków wschodnioeuropejskich, w tym Vaclav Havel, Aleksander Kwaśniewski, była prezydent Łotwy Vaira Vike-Freiberga podpisało się pod listem otwartym do prezydenta Obamy. Oskarżyli w nim Rosję o to, że "chcąc rozszerzyć strefę swych interesów, używa jawnych i tajnych sposobów wojny ekonomicznej, poczynając od blokad energetycznych i inwestycji motywowanych politycznie, a na przekupstwach i manipulowaniu mediami kończąc".To poważne oskarżenia poważnych ludzi, którzy martwią się, że administracja USA straciła zainteresowanie Europą Wschodnią i Środkową. Ogłoszona przez Baracka Obamę polityka "resetu" wobec Rosji jest mile widziana, ale wspomnianych przywódców europejskich niepokoi nowy "realizm" w stosunkach z Moskwą. Mówią, że gdyby taki realizm przeważał od 1990 r., Polska i inne kraje nie byłyby ani w NATO, ani w UE. To idealizm kazał rządowi Clintona wciągnąć Europę Wschodnią do NATO. To idealistyczna wizja Europy sprawiła, że Tony Blair całkowicie poparł przyjęcie Polski, Węgier i Czech do UE wbrew eurosceptycznym realistom, niechętnym otwarciu rynku pracy i unijnego budżetu na wschód.Teraz administracja Obamy musi jasno dać do zrozumienia, że będzie kontynuować tradycję rozpoczętą przez prezydenta Harry'ego Trumana, popierania konstrukcji euroatlantyckich i integracji poprzez NATO i Unię Europejską. Pomimo poważnych różnic w sprawie np. wojny w Wietnamie, a ostatnio w Iraku dla kolejnych prezydentów USA więzi euroatlantyckie były fundamentem polityki zagranicznej.Najlepiej byłoby, gdyby na drugim końcu amerykańskiego mostu do Eurazji znalazła się Rosja. Żeby tak się stało, Rosja musi uznać - tak jak zrobiły to Niemcy, Francja, Wielka Brytania i Hiszpania - że czasy imperiów i sfer wpływów się skończyły. Zamiast pokazywać, że 56-latek może mieć duże mięśnie, Władimir Putin mógłby pokazać, jak wielki ma mózg i serce - porzucić nacjonalistyczną retorykę i dostrzec w sąsiadach przyszłych przyjaciół zamiast przeszłych wasali i potencjalnych wrogów.Gruzja to dobre miejsce, by zacząć. Ta mała czarnomorska demokracja nie była zagrożeniem dla Stalina 90 lat temu i nie jest zagrożeniem dla Putina dzisiaj. Gdyby pozwolił Gruzji być sobą, to raz na zawsze pogrzebałby rosnące podejrzenia, że Rosji marzy się nowa zimna wojna.autor był posłem Partii Pracy oraz ministrem stanu ds. europejskich, jest delegatem Wielkiej Brytanii do Rady Europy.

Foreign policy : David Cameron's treatment of Tory dissidents

This was posted on the Progress web-site
Spot the difference
David Cameron's differing treatment of two Tory dissidents tells us a lot about where his priorities lie
17 August 2009
What is the difference between Daniel Hannan and Edward Macmillan Scott? Both are long-serving Conservative MEPs and were re-elected in July 2009. Both are true blue Tories. Both are eloquent communicators. Macmillan Scott has more seniority as he led the Tory MEP group in the 1990s when the majority of MEPs were Labour. Hannan represents south east England where UKIP is popular. Macmillan Scott represents Yorkshire and Humberside where Tory MPs have been thin on the ground since 1997 so he has had to carry the Conservative flag in the north of England during the long decade plus of Labour hegemony in Westminster. Both are Eurosceptics, opposed to the Lisbon Treaty, free marketeer and open traders.
But there the similarity stops. Hannan has gone on American television to trash the NHS to the delight of the American right. Macmillan Scott is concerned about the rise of what he calls ‘respectable fascism' and thinks that the Conservative party would be better advised not to enter into alliance with right-wing extremists in Polish politics.
Cameron's response to Hannan was a friendly cuff over the head describing his attack on the NHS on US television as ‘eccentric'. A few months ago Cameron described Hannan as ‘brilliant' and on the whole most British citizens would consider the adjectives ‘eccentric' and ‘brilliant' as rather warm endorsements.
Macmillan Scott's opposition to the homophobic and racist right in eastern Europe and his criticisms of the anti-Jewish remarks made by a Polish politician Cameron particularly favours has met with a different response. Cameron has suspended Macmillan Scott's membership of the Tory MEP group. Propagandists like Tim Montgomerie of ConservativeHome have called for Macmillan Scott to be expelled from the Conservative party like some dissident in the 1970s or 1980s who had dared defy the official party line.
The brutal treatment of Macmillan Scott is in sharp contrast to the language used about Hannan. Macmillan Scott is cast into the outer darkness of the party he has loved and served with distinction. Hannan can now continue his work of whipping up right-wing sentiment in Britain, Europe and America with the endorsement of being ‘brilliant' if ‘eccentric' from David Cameron. This tells us something of Cameron's judgment. He allows an NHS-hater away free. He punishes someone who is critical of extremist positions by rightwing European politicians.

Observer's article on the House of Commons' reform

The Commons will be robbed of independence and authority
Observer
9 August 2009
A long-serving Labour MP warns that the quality of Member of Parliament will suffer

It was Trollope who wrote that to have the initials MP after one's name was the noblest ambition an Englishman could seek.
No longer. After centuries in which a small wood-lined room, not much bigger than a tennis court, allowed a few hundred fellow citizens to speak their minds freely, ferociously or fawningly, as they desired or the occasion required, it is time to say farewell to the MP as a unique British institution.
The roll call of those who are leaving reduces the independence and authority of the Commons in a way not seen for decades. Labour is losing Chris Mullin and Andrew MacKinlay – two of the most independent backbenchers the Commons has ever known. Who can forget MacKinlay shouting at Dr David Kelly: "You're chaff, aren't you? Chaff. You've been left hung out to dry by the MoD." Mullin used the cloak of privilege to uncover the mammoth scandal of the Birmingham Six – men imprisoned for years for a crime they did not commit.
MacKinlay says he is quitting because the seven-day weeks MPs put in, and the requirement from constituents that MPs now reply instantly by email to every inquiry 52 weeks a year, is exhausting.
The doctor chosen by Totnes voters as their Conservative candidate will find that not only has she reduced her salary by two thirds, but that she has to be much more available to constituents than any GP's appointments system is to patients.
There are doctors in the House, such as the energetic Evan Harris or Liam Fox. But both are full-time politicians. The clamour to deprofessionalise politics by rubbishing MPs, councillors, long-serving political activists and those who try to keep party politics alive suits the secret power-holders in Britain – the media proprietors, the City and the permanent state bureaucrats, who have always believed the country would be better run if politicians did not get in the way.
Farewell to Tory MPs such as Ann Widdecombe, Nicholas Winterton and Anthony Steen. Labour MPs will never forget the courage of Widdecombe as she stood tiny and alone on the Tory benches to denounce foxhunting.
Nicholas Winterton is a stout rightist wearing his £ lapel badge to tell the world he does not like Europe. Yet in the 1980s he was alone in denouncing Robert Mugabe's massacres in Matabeleland. The Thatcher government rubbished him and the Major government awarded Mugabe a knighthood. But Winterton was right and the establishment was wrong.
Anthony Steen will rue the day he tried to defend the allowance he claimed along with David Cameron, George Osborne, Gordon Brown, Alistair Darling, Nick Clegg, me and about 600 other MPs because we were told it was part of our total compensation package.
Now we know we were wrong and MPs, unless they are millionaires like David Cameron and his front bench, will no longer be able to see their families grow up by having homes in London and constituency.
So be it. But Steen is a lone voice in the Commons raising with a persistence bordering on the manic the plight of young children who disappear from local-authority care. He has single-handedly made into a Commons issue the hidden slavery of young girls trafficked as prostitutes to satiate the dirty old men in our community. When he goes, who will speak for these voiceless teenage victims of the sex trade?
The demand that all MPs should enter the Commons only after years of experience in other jobs has a pleasing populist air to it. Yet this principle would have meant farewell to Pitt, Churchill, Gladstone, or more recently Tony Benn or Charles Kennedy, or any number of MPs who were elected as young men and became effective precisely because they engaged in the profession of politics at an early age. Should William Hague, elected in his 20s, now go and do work experience? Does David Cameron's few years spinning for Carlton TV make him a better Tory leader?
The Commons now has to say farewell to QCs – no more John Smiths or Quintin Hoggs. Farewell to doctors or dentists who still want to practise – forcing Howard Stoate, MP and GP, to retire. The new rules make writing an article or a book all but impossible. When I told the Commons authorities that a book review I published recently was written on a Sunday in a snatched free hour, they said that MPs have no free time of their own and anything I write must be reported to them.
Tory wannabe candidates are now going through a five-hour interview as if they were applying to join the civil service. The odds and sods, the cranks and campaigners, the youthful Hagues and Blairs, will all be excluded.
Welcome to the new House of Commons, courtesy of the Barclay brothers and a British public going through one of its periodic fits of morality. In signing our allowance claim forms, did MPs realise we were signing the death warrant of the idea of independent professional political representative democracy? We have only ourselves to blame, but the consequences for democracy may be dire.

Article published in Spanish newspaper on the importance of a strong European policy for Spain

The position of Spain in Europe would be reinforced should the People's Party stop using the prospect of Kosovo's recognition put forward by the Spanish government as a political tool
ESPAÑA DEBE SER MÁS EUROPEA
ABC
8 August 2009

¿Puede un Estado europeo moderno tener su propia política exterior independiente? Cuando el jefe del Estado puede estar informado en cuestión de segundos de cualquier acontecimiento importante que afecte a su país, ¿qué le queda al ministro de Asuntos Exteriores? La verdad es que bastante. La diplomacia y la necesidad de una política exterior cuidadosamente elaborada no se pueden suplantar, porque un país que no sepa cómo pensar y actuar a escala internacional estará en desventaja a la hora de lograr sus objetivos.
Europa carece actualmente de una política exterior coherente. Tiene uno de los mejores estadistas del mundo en materia de política exterior en la persona de Javier Solana, pero la incansable labor de éste, que ha permitido a España estar en el centro de la toma de decisiones clave tanto en la OTAN como en la UE durante más de una década, no puede sustituir la ausencia de una voluntad firme respecto a lo que debería ser la política exterior común.
A Europa le falta una visión común en cuestiones esenciales. ¿Qué actitud debe adoptar frente a Turquía? La derecha europea, personificada por Nicolas Sarzoky y Angela Merkel, es hostil a que Turquía avance en su objetivo de convertirse en miembro de la UE. La izquierda europea (Gordon Brown en Londres y José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero en Madrid) ha adoptado un planteamiento más a largo plazo y considera que una Turquía que mire al oeste hacia Europa es mucho mejor que una Turquía que se sienta aislada y que mire al este y al sur, bajo influencia islamista, o al norte, hacia Rusia.
¿Qué posición adoptar frente a Rusia? El eslogan en Moscú es «Arriba Rusia, abajo EE.UU., fuera Europa». Tontamente, algunos líderes europeos han caído en el juego del Kremlin al pretender entablar una relación mano a mano con Vladimir Putin en lugar de forjar una política europea común y mantenerla. Pekín y Nueva Delhi, al igual que Moscú, prefieren negociar con una Europa disgregada.
La tarea más importante para España a la hora de prepararse para la crucial presidencia de la Unión Europea será invitar a los líderes de Europa a trabajar como un equipo por encima de los egoísmos nacionales. Esto significa decirle la verdad a la opinión pública nacional, que suele plantearse la política exterior en función de su orgullo, su historia y su identidad nacionales.
Pero el nacionalismo y la ideología son malos consejeros para una buena política exterior. Felipe González lo entendió cuando luchó por el sí en el referéndum sobre el ingreso de España en la OTAN hace más de 20 años.
El ministro Moratinos también ha comprendido este punto tan fundamental con su valiente visita a Gibraltar. A los que odian a España en el Peñón, así como al poderoso grupo de presión londinense a favor de Gibraltar, les encantaría ver que Madrid trata Gibraltar como una cuestión de orgullo nacional originada por tres siglos de ocupación inglesa. Pero Moratinos les ha robado la baza al acceder a visitar Gibraltar. Éste es en líneas generales el estilo de Moratinos. Moratinos entiende la expresión francesa «Les absents ont toujours tort» (los que no van siempre se arrepienten), y se asegura de que España está presente, aunque a algunos en Washington les moleste que viaje a Cuba y a Venezuela para hablar con sus caudillos locales.
Moratinos es de los que tienden por naturaleza a solucionar problemas, no a crearlos. Esto a veces provoca las críticas de los que quieren que la política exterior sea toda grandes gestos y voces gritonas al estilo de Metternich, Palmerson o, más recientemente, Dominique de Villepin o Hugo Chávez.
España puede suponer una diferencia decisiva para el futuro de Europa si utiliza la presidencia de la UE para fomentar la paz en los Balcanes. Esto debe empezar por un reconocimiento de Kosovo, que nunca jamás aceptará el dominio de Belgrado.
La posición de España en Europa se vería reforzada si el PP accede a no utilizar políticamente una hipotética decisión del Gobierno del PSOE de reconocer Kosovo. España puede ser un actor poderoso en política exterior si se vuelve más europea. Esto requerirá distinguir claramente entre el interés nacional de España y las sensibilidades políticas de los partidos en cuanto a la identidad y al orgullo nacionales.
Con París y Berlín cada vez menos capaces de cooperar, Londres esperando unas elecciones que podrían dar paso a un Gobierno conservador antieuropeo y Roma enredada en las excentricidades de Berlusconi, Madrid tiene la oportunidad de ejercer un liderazgo real en materia de política exterior.

Newsweek article on extradition and the push for supranational criminal law

The Long Arm of the Law
Increasingly, there's no place to hide.

Newsweek

25 July 2009
(from the magazine issue dated 3 August 2009)

In the new movie Public Enemies, Johnny Depp plays John Dillinger, the 1930s bank robber and killer who gets hunt-ed down and shot by the newly formed FBI. The key to FBI success was to break down the barriers to cross-state criminal-catching that had previously allowed crooks to skip across state borders and thumb their noses at lawmen constrained by interstate rivalries.
Something similar is now happening internationally, as the United States and European countries come to the realization that the globalization of crime means the law and justice systems limited by state borders are no longer sufficient. As yet there is no global J. Edgar Hoover, still less a WBI—a World Bureau of Investigation—hunting down today's post-national criminals. But the barriers to supranational policing and justice are slowly being eroded.
Take the case of Simon Shepherd and Steven Whittle, two men from northern England who posted ugly anti-Jewish rants on a Web site hosted by a provider based in the United States. Britain now takes a much tougher line on anti-Semitic hate than in the past, and last year a Yorkshire jury found the men guilty of racist and anti-Semitic crimes. But before they could be sentenced, they skipped bail and flew to Los Angeles, confident that America's constitutional right to free speech would protect them. Instead a California judge shipped them home to England, where they were convicted in July and sent to serve three-year prison sentences. Similarly, a U.S. court in July sent the former Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega to France to answer money-laundering charges. And after more than a decade under the protection of the British legal system, Rachid Ramda, the Islamist financier behind the 1995 Paris Métro bombing, was finally sent to face trial in Paris in 2005 and is now serving life. Indeed, since the U.S. and Britain signed a new extradition treaty five years ago, there has been a dramatic increase in the numbers of accused being sent home to face justice on both sides of the Atlantic—reflecting a growing sentiment that criminals should not be allowed to shelter behind differences in countries' legal systems.
Supranational law enforcement and justice is tricky. Conservative legal theoreticians worry that supranational law impinges on national sovereignty; liberals fear that other nations' legal systems may not be up to scratch. The genuine tensions between universal rules and the hard-won traditions of national law are not easy to resolve. No European country will extradite for a crime that could carry the death penalty to a U.S. state that carries out executions. Abortion may be legal in one country; rape may not be a felony crime in another.Murder is murder, but tax avoidance, financial fraud, and hate crimes are more amorphous, leading to the possibility that individuals and companies will be forced to contend with a perplexing patchwork of regulation to avoid running afoul of any one nation's laws. For instance, the U.S. Constitution protects free speech in a way that British, French, and German laws forbidding race hatred or Holocaust denial would not. British bankers can face charges in the U.S. if they have done business in Cuba—a proposition no European will accept.
Moreover, some British politicians like to puff themselves up like a latter-day Lord Palmerston, the British prime minister who announced the doctrine of "civis Britannicus sum"—I am a British citizen (and can be tried only in a British court)—based on the imperial arrogance that Britain would not allow any other legal jurisdiction to prevail. British politicians are now out in force trying to stop the extradition of a computer hacker, Gary McKibbon, who broke into the U.S. government's secret networks. His case highlights the new nature of post-national crime and its enforcement: when is cybercrime just a geek obsession, and when does it reveal the state's defenses against terrorism? Squaring these differences will not be easy.
Yet the push for supranational law and order grows. In 2004, a major step forward was taken with the creation of a European arrest warrant, which has reduced average extradition time between EU member states from 18 months to 50 days. The old jokes that British criminals could retire to the "Costa del Crime" in Spain—true when Franco's Spain had no extradition agreements with other European states—have disappeared. More than 1,000 British police and frontier officers now work in France keeping an eye on the flow of undesirables into Britain. After the July 2005 terrorist bombings in London, one of the wanted men, Hussain Osman, fled to Rome expecting that civil-liberty lawyers there would protect him. Instead, he was shipped back to London within weeks. As with Dillinger in 1933, today's criminals are less and less able to cross a state frontier and assume they are safe. How long before we get a global 21st-century version of The Untouchables?

Find this article at http://www.newsweek.com/id/208448

Article in the Independent on the Tories' alliance with Kaminski

What does Cameron gain from alliance with extremists?
Kaminski's views on Jews and gays put him at the rough end of BNP politics
Independent
30 July 2009
Welcome to the Cam-Kam, the new dance of the European hard right. Choreographed by William Hague, the new dance-master for the Europe-hating media and Tory millionaire MPs, the Cam-Kam allows the worst of 20th-century politics – dislike of Jews, gays, immigrants – to prance and preen on the European stage.
Named after the alliance between David Cameron and Michal Kaminski, the Cam-Kam reminds watchers of the worst of ultra-nationalist politics.
It shows a side of the Tory leader that is far removed from the Andy Coulson image of the heir to Blair raising politics to a higher plane.
As a child of the post-1968 liberated and liberal Notting Hill classes it is impossible to conceive of Cameron with a gram of anti-gay or anti-Jewish prejudice.
On the contrary, he has spoken warmly of the values and contribution of the Jewish community in Britain and those who have heard him speak do not doubt the sincerity of his views.
Equally he has promoted gay Shadow Cabinet members and apologised for the Tory line on Section 28.
So why this alliance against his own nature with Michal Kaminski, a Polish right-wing politician whose views on Jews, on gays, on immigrants, on President Obama would place him at the very rough end of BNP politics in Britain?
The Conservatives like to pretend that Kaminski's views are those of an exuberant youth and have even compared him to the Jewish John Bercow who was a staunch rightist in his days as a student political activist.
To be sure, Kaminski was part of the European National Front under the leadership of the Italian fascist Roberto Fiore. This had the Spanish Falange and other far, far-right parties in membership. Kaminski made his personal pilgrimage to see General Pinochet when he was detained in Britain.
But Kaminski's more extreme utterances, like his handing out leaflets at Warsaw station urging Ukrainian immigrant workers to go home – a Polish jobs for Polish workers appeal – have continued into this century.
Kaminski protests that he is not anti-Semitic. But what is the adjective to use for a man who is accused of organising a campaign against the brave decision of the then Polish President Alexander Kwasniewski to apologise for the massacre of Jews at the hand of Polish villagers in 1941?
Polish nationalist politics has always, to put it politely, had difficulties with the Jewish question. The pre-war Endecja party of Roman Dmowski was anti-Jewish. In 1968 the communist government expelled Jewish students and intellectuals who played a key role in exile in supporting the creation of the Solidarity union movement.
Bronislaw Geremek was one of the stars of that movement, later Poland's foreign minister and an MEP. He was Jewish and when he was killed in a car accident last summer supporters of the anti-Semitic Radio Maryja held up a poster at his funeral saying: "Thank you God for taking him away."
On the MEP list headed by Kaminski there were included candidates from openly anti-Jewish politics.
This sadly is the world of religious right-wing politics in Poland. It is not neo-Nazi and when the Chief Rabbi in Warsaw was attacked he received a sympathy call from the current Polish President, Lech Kaczynski, who is Kaminski's mentor. And most Polish rightists support Likud in Israel as the Jewish quesion in Poland is about national politics, not about Israel.
Nonetheless it remains odd that David Cameron has led the Tories into an alliance with a man whose views on Jews would not be permitted in British, let alone American politics.
The Civic Platform ruling party in Poland is close to being the mirror of the Tories – pro-market, patriotic, sceptical about Brussels, and vaguely liberal. Why didn't the Tories make a more natural alliance with them? Some analysts take the Cam-Kam alliance back to his campaign to become Tory leader when he promised hardline anti-EU MPs anything to win support.
But Cameron has reneged on previous promises and it remains a puzzle why he has chosen Kaminski of all politicians in Europe to be his new ally and friend.
The upside is all for the Pole but what benefit does Cameron get? In all events the Cam-Kam tango will end in tears, as in the unending Euro political dance it is important to choose partners very carefully indeed.

Kaminsky : replies to Tory MEP Timothy Kirkhope, by Edward Pearce and Denis MacShane

Tories cannot whitewash new ally's fascist past
Yorkshire Post
15th August 2009

The Yorkshire Post on 12 August published an article by the Tory MEP Timothy Kirkhope defending the Tory alliance with Michal Kaminski, the controversial right-wing Polish politician accused of making offensive remarks about gays and about a wartime massacre of Jews in Poland. Today (15 August) the YP published a letter from me and from the writer Edward Pearce on the Kaminski affair.

IN 1980 and 1981, I was active in Poland in support for the Polish union, Solidarity. I wrote the first book in English on the Solidarity movement, published in 1981. In 1982, I was arrested and imprisoned in Warsaw while running money to the underground union.
I was therefore interested to read the view of Timothy Kirkhope MEP (Yorkshire Post, August 12) that the Polish MEP Michal Kaminski "fought in the underground against Poland's authoritarian Communist regime". Mr Kaminski's controversial statements on Jews and gays have attracted attention since Conservative MEPs were instructed to serve under his leadership in the European Parliament. In 1982, Mr Kaminski was 10 years old and between that time and the first free elections in Poland in 1989, I do not doubt that, like every other schoolboy in Poland, he hated communism and took part in protests. However, he went a stage further by joining the openly fascistic National Rebirth of Poland party. This party has been branded by the US State Department as anti-semitic. It remains an unusual way of supporting democracy in Poland by joining a fascist party. Mr Kirkhope should not line up Mr Kaminski with the many Poles who were imprisoned, forced into exile, lost their jobs and worse. America's Anti-Defamation League which investigates anti-semitic activity worldwide reported that, in 2001, Mr Kaminski "mobilised the local population in the north-eastern Polish town of Jedwabne against a commemoration of a wartime pogrom against Jewish people". Mr Kaminski has also used disgusting language about gay people. These are facts which no amount of spin can whitewash. Timothy Kirkhope and all Tories I work with in combating anti-semitism are strong supporters of the Jewish communities in Britain. Kaminski now says he supports the Common Agricultural Policy and the Lisbon Treaty which British Conservatives oppose. I do not blame Timothy Kirkhope who is a hard-working and decent Yorkshire MEP, as is Edward McMillan-Scott who has been expelled from the Conservatives because he questioned Mr Kaminski's credentials. As a loyal Labour Party MP, I understand why Mr Kirkhope has to try to defend Mr Kaminski, as the Pole has been imposed as leader of British Tory MEPs by David Cameron and William Hague. But this alliance cannot last and it would be better for Britain if Tory MEPs simply acted as an independent group in the European Parliament...
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TIMOTHY Kirkhope's assault upon Edward McMillan-Scott (Yorkshire Post, August 12) is an unworthy cringe in a dubious direction, and the facts he claims are vividly in dispute. He says that Michal Kaminski, the Polish ultra-rightwinger whom Mr McMillan-Scott, shamefully thinking for himself, voted against, has "refuted" charges of anti-semitism. To "refute" means to overturn charges comprehensively. Mr Kaminski has, I think, merely denied them. In the New Statesman, James Macintyre points out that the National Revival of Poland (NOP) in its manifesto actually quoted Mein Kampf: "Jews will be removed from Poland, and their possessions will be confiscated." He also alleges that, in 2001, Mr Kaminski "condemned President Kwasniewski of Poland, for apologising over the massacre of hundreds of Jews in Jedwabne". The date of this insult falls 12 years late for Mr Kirkhope's claim that his new colleague was only in the NOP as a gallant little fighter against Communist rule. Before he misuses the word "refute" again, he should ask Michal Kaminski much harder questions very closely. If his new colleague cannot give an exhaustive demonstration of his innocence over these (and other) charges, the Conservatives should apologise to a fully restored Edward McMillan-Scott.
Edward Pearce, Thormanby, York.