The Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) is to release documents vclaiming that former president Aleksander Kwasniewksi collaborated with the communist secret service.

Janusz Kurtyka, head of the IPN, has announced that in October the institute will publish documents on Aleksander Kwasniewski’s cooperation with the communist secret services (SB).

Kurtyka accuses the former President of being registered under the codename ‘Alek’ in communist secret services files. In his opinion, thus is a proof of Kwasniewski being a secret agent rather than a victim of SB surveillance.

Aleksander Kwasniewski has strongly denied the charges.

“I know who I am and who I was. I was never a secret agent registered as ‘Alek’ or under any other codename and this has already been proven,” stated Kwasniewski. In 2000, the Lustration Court, a vetting court to determine whether public officials cooperated with communist secret services, verified that Kwasniewski was never a secret agent or cooperated with the service.

Kwasniewski claims that the IPN’s allegations come are a form of revenge for having called the IPN an “Institute of Liars”. Kwasniewski also said as a joke that it must have been Kurtyka himself who registered him.

The Institute of National Remembrance, which was set up to research crimes against the Polish nation by communists and Nazis, has been accused of pursuing a vendetta against politicians seen as against members of the Law and Justice party, particularly opponents of Lech and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, including former president Lech Walesa. (mg)