Post-communist military secret services 'exceeded legal objectives', says a report report made public today.

Military secret services (WSI) that operated in Poland after the fall of communism, largely exceeded their legal objectives and were involved in a number of criminal irregularities, states the long-awaited government report on the activity of the now resolved Polish military secret services.

The publication of the report is an element of the current Polish government's policy of clearing the public life of dangerous entanglements with the past.

'This is supposed to be a warning for all those who think that military services, or secret services in general, are allowed to influence a democratic state. They may do that, but only in order to protect democracy and not destroy it,' said Defence Minister Aleksander Szczygło.

The communist-rooted military intelligence did not fulfill its regular counter-intelligence duties properly, was involved in economic crime and weapon trading on a large scale, exerted illegitimate influence on media and politics in democratic Poland, concludes the report.

One of the striking revelations of the report is also the involvement of Polish military intelligence with the Russian secret services, with some Polish WSI officers having been trained in the Soviet Union. Reportedly, the WSI were also suspiciously lenient towards the activity of Russian intelligence in Poland.

'This report clearly proves that the WSI, frankly speaking, went wild after the overthrow of Communism in Poland in 1989. And it's not about individual agents, but it seems to be the case about the entire service which, roughly, acted as a state within a state, with one clear objective - to make money in illegal transactions,' commented journalist Krzysztof Leski.

According to the commission that authored the report, over 2500 agents of the former military secret services infiltrated Polish public life in the 1990s, following the collapse of communism.

The report mentions names of public officials and journalists whose secret cooperation with the military intelligence was in breach of the law.

Among those mentioned as responsible for irregularities in this area were Poland's former presidents, famous solidarity leader Lech Wałęsa and the post-communist Aleksander Kwaśniewski. The report caused uproar and heated discussion, with many of the accused denying the charges and saying they will sue the report authors for libel. General Marek Dukaczewski, former head of the military intelligence says he was unaware of the alleged criminal irregularities: 'No important documents were destroyed in order to hide traces of any illegal operations. I don't know of any such cases and for sure, while I was in charge, no such situation took place.' Report authors say the document is incomplete and will be amended many times before it reaches its final shape. More names and facts on WSI irregularities are expected to surface.