Dear Sir,

I am writing in reference to a review of Jan Tomasz Gross’ book Fear, Poland’s Guilty Secret by Jack Hibberd published in The Australian on 14th October 2006. Gross’ work is highly controversial. Some go so far as to call him a liar disseminating hate through literature.

Hibberd’s review presents these questionable facts further coloured with his own distorted interpretations into a shocking anti-Polish essay. I am surprised that it was published in a newspaper of such high standing. For what purpose?

Would not a national publication with such a wide readership as the Australian have a moral or ethical obligation to ensure published material is not misleading? That it is at the very least properly researched and accurate?

At a time when there has been so much concern demonstrated by our leaders about the preaching of Muslim clerics and their effects on the integration and harmony of ethnic groups in our community, a national newspaper is publishing malicious distorted opinions as though they are historical facts. Why?

Many Australian-Poles are combatants, allies from WWII, survivors of Germany’s Third Reich persecutions, Polish Solidarity members who greatly contributed to the fall of communism in central and Eastern Europe. These and many others are now a well-integrated ethnic group within the wider multicultural Australian community. We honour Australian servicemen and women. Why are these people’s reputations being tarnished?

To trawl through a person’s or nation’s history and present to the public only the most negative events in the worst possible light is character assassination and defamation. To throw in baseless lies is worse.

There is enough hatred in Iraq where Polish along with British, American and Australian soldiers (Coalition of the willing) are wounded or die in their efforts to restore peace and harmony. They also stand beside Australian troops in Afghanistan in the war against terror. Are they not allies? And if so are we not embarrassed as a nation to promulgate through our press such rubbish?

As a WWII survivor of Siberian deportation (1940-1945) and of communist oppression in post war Poland, now an Australian citizen with children and grandchildren born in Australia, I am aggrieved and turn to you as the elected representatives of our community to ensure this does not go unchallenged.

I think that a newspaper and its editors should be held accountable. We do not want rifts within our community such as the Cronulla riots, so what is the Australian Newspaper’s or Hibberd’s agenda?

I will not criticise Hibberd’s review in this letter. Instead I enclose copies of published texts of protests by the Ambassador of Poland, the Polish Community Council of Australia, The Australian Poland Business Council, and excerpts from Puls Polonii. As you can see I have many questions and look forward to your reply.

Yours sincerely
Jerzy B.Prociuk