Will a Pole take the helm of NATO, a politically correct view of European history and a Polish opera company on a tour of Japan.
Press reviewed by Michal Kubicki
Several papers refer to speculations in the German press that Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski and former president Aleksander Kwasniewski are among the candidates for the post of NATO’s secretary general. According to POLSKA, Kwasniewski stands a better chance for the nomination. If a Pole gets the prestigious position, the paper says, his main goal would be to convince the West that NATO should go ahead with its expansion plan and invite Ukraine and Georgia.
GAZETA WYBORCZA argues that Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski is an almost ideal candidate for a NATO boss. He served as defence minister, is a staunch advocate of trans-Atlantic alliance, is fluent in English and comes from a country of ‘a new Europe’. It is a big question, however, if the United States and the countries of ‘the old Europe’ would like to have someone like Sikorski at a crucial time of defining a new strategic doctrine, the Afghanistan operation and the alliance’s further expansion. That was GAZETA WYBORCZA.
DZIENNIK writes in an editorial that the nomination of a Polish politician would demonstrate to Moscow that it has nothing to say on issues relating to its former satellites. It would overcome a division into old and new Europeans.
The UN climate conference in Poznan is reported extensively in all the papers. DZIENNIK says that the capital of Western Poland is this month the world’s ecological capital and Poland should do its best to promote itself as a modern country with a vision of the future. The paper also has hints addressed to the man-in-the-street under the motto: ‘What can YOU do to protect the environment’. They cover insulation, the use of water, selecting energy efficient washing machines and refrigerators and so on.
RZECZPOSPOLITA takes a critical look at the plans of the Museum of European History, a project sponsored by the European Parliament. According to the daily, it is a politically correct vision of European history, in which there is no mention of the 1920 war between Poland and Soviet Russia, which claims that Poles stopped fighting against Nazi Germany in October 1939 and belittles the positive role of Christianity in the history of the continent.
On the arts pages, GAZETA WYBORCZA has a report from Japan, where the Warsaw Chamber Opera is on a tour with Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro and The Magic Flute, and Rossini’s The Barber of Seville. Even though the company’s fifth visit to Japan, it is a major challenge, considering that its Warsaw home seats 250 whereas some of the halls in Japan have an auditorium for three and a half thousand. But there are many bright sides too. A member of the orchestra told the paper: ‘Japan is probably the only country in the world these days where artists are received as kings’.