He was also disturbed that some prominent Poles were defending the secret prison, including former president Lech Walesa, the former leader of the pro-democracy Solidarity movement, of which Josef Pinior was also a member. Unlike Pinior, however, Walesa, while declaring that he is "against torture," has stated, "This is war, and war has its particular rules." Bodnar lamented, "The same guys who helped create the constitution now seem to be approving the violation of the constitution."
The Los Angeles Times also noted that some Polish commentators "fear negative repercussions for Poland's relationship with its most valued ally, the U.S.," which, predictably, has failed to cooperate with the Polish prosecutors. Even so, Mikolaj Pietrzak has vowed to continue to push for accountability, noting, as the paper put it, "If it turns out that senior Polish leaders are implicated in the end, causing political and social uproar, so be it." As he explained, "The truth is going to come out sooner or later. The question is whether it's going to come out thanks to Poland, thanks to the active role of the prosecutor, or whether it's going to come out in spite of the prosecutor's failure to act." He added, "It is a hot potato, but I don't care. This case isn't going away."
For now, the agreement about the establishment of the prison, which was handed over to prosecutors in April -- and the information about the cage, which has just surfaced -- demonstrates, not for the first time, that documents exist revealing what was supposed to remain hidden. My friend Anna Minkiewicz -- who took me to Poland last February to promote the documentary film "Outside the Law: Stories from Guantà �namo," which I co-directed with Polly Nash -- explained further details that were not mentioned in the U.S. accounts and added her own interpretations.
Noting that the agreement that bore no U.S. signature -- just that of Zbigniew Siemiatkowski -- was written in both English and Polish, she suggested that someone in the service kept the document in spite of its having no "official' value, either through bureaucratic zeal, for conscientious reasons, hoping that one day it would serve the purpose it is serving now, or out of a sense of self-preservation, pointing the blame on those who were culpable if the whole sordid scenario ever became public.
She also noted that the emergence of the latest documents suggested that someone was "regularly leaking documents in small doses." She added that Josef Pinior said that "more and more people are contacting him with information, including people who live in the area" where the prison was established, as well as the insiders with whom he has, presumably, been in communication for many years.
In conclusion, she explained that the current situation is particularly interesting, because, as a senator, Pinior has parliamentary immunity and therefore cannot be stopped from speaking out. It is to be hoped that, as more information continues to leak out, Senator Pinior will continue to point out that too much of a paper trail exists for this shameful episode in Poland and America's recent history to be suppressed.
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