Poland begins exhuming bodies of Smolensk air crash

Six years after they were buried, Poland’s state prosecutor has begun to exhume the remains of those who died in an air crash in western Russia – beginning with former president Lech Kaczynski and his wife Maria.

In total, 96 people died in the 2010 air crash near Smolensk, mostly senior state officials on their way to a memorial service.

Two investigations, Polish and Russian, concluded the crash was caused by human error and poor weather conditions, but Mr Kaczynski’s surviving twin brother Jaroslaw believes the plane crash was caused deliberately – possibly by a fire or explosion on board.

After six years of monthly vigils before Warsaw’s presidential palace, and a year after his national conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party took office, the exhumations began on Monday.

While Kaczynski supporters have welcomed the year-long process of exhuming the bodies to test for traces of explosion, many relatives of the dead have protested against the move – to no avail.

Open letter

Last month, over 200 relatives of 17 Smolensk crash victims wrote an open letter to President Andrzej Duda, saying they felt “abandoned and distraught in the face of a cruel and heartless act” of exhuming their loved ones’ remains.

Mr Jaroslaw Kaczynski has said Poland will never be “truly free without the truth” on Smolensk.

His supporters point to how Russia has never released the wreck of the plane. They have also criticised how some body parts were placed in the wrong coffins.

But Poland’s political opposition have dismissed the PiS party’s version of events as an attempt to transform a tragic accident into a founding myth for Mr Kaczynski’s party and a new Polish state it is trying to create.

The long-running Smolensk drama – subject of a recent, conspiracy-filled film – has divided and exhausted Poles.

Just 10 per cent approve of the exhumations, according to an Ipsos poll last week, though one in five believe the exhumation may bring new information about the circumstances of the crash.

Assassination

On April 10th, 2010, a high-level Polish delegation was flying to Russia for a ceremony remembering thousands of Polish army officers killed by Soviet forces in 1940 in the forest of Katyn.

The president’s Tupelov plane crashed shortly before landing, killing all on board. PiS supporters see in the tragedy a deliberate assassination by Russia and a subsequent cover-up.

The original Polish and Moscow investigators deny any wrongdoing and stand by their reports. The Polish report blamed adverse weather conditions, poor guidance by Russian air-traffic controllers and an inexperienced pilot.

Russia’s investigation blamed the Polish pilot, suggesting he came under pressure to land the plane in dense fog from an air force commander heard.

Former prime minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz has accused Mr Kaczynski of “exploiting the death of his own beloved brother” for political gain.

Mr Kaczynski’s critics say there is little chance of a neutral investigation considering how the state prosecutor who ordered the exhumations was absorbed into the justice ministry shortly after the PiS took office a year ago.