Polish President Lech Kaczynski warned on Tuesday against efforts to rewrite history as nearly 20 European leaders gathered on Poland’s Baltic coast to mark the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War Two.
Russia and its former satellites in eastern Europe are at loggerheads over the role of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin in 1939, when he clinched a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany that opened the way for the invasion of Poland and world war.
While Russians are deeply proud of their country’s victory over Hitler in 1945, Poles, Balts and others say Stalin also bears direct responsibility for the outbreak of war for carving up Poland with Hitler and also annexing the Baltic states. More at Reuters