Att: Ms Kirsti McLish
Audience and Consumer Affairs
GPO Box 9994 ACT 2601
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Dear Ms McLish,

On behalf of the Australian-Polish Community Council of the ACT and District, I am writing to draw your urgent attention to a very serious matter involving the credibility of ABC TV's popular and influential weekday evening current affairs programme Lateline, hosted by the respected Mr. Tony Jones. The Tuesday 12 May (Federal Budget night) edition of Lateline, screened at peak viewing time, carried a grossly misleading item presented by Ms Lisa Miller immediately following Budget coverage and comment (just before Lateline Business).

Referring to the extradition from the USA to Germany of Mr. Ivan Demianiuk, a former member of a collaborationist Ukrainian unit in Nazi German service alleged to have participated in murdering 29,000 Jews as a guard in a German World War II extermination camp, the report on ABC TV Lateline described the camp as "a Polish concentration camp". Whether used deliberately or not, this description is not only highly misleading but also grossly defamatory. It constitutes a grave distortion of historical truth and is very hurtful to the Australian-Polish community, and indeed to all Poles, persons of Polish extraction and their friends. In this context, it is irrelevant whether Mr. Demianiuk (once convicted by an Israeli court but then acquitted by a superior Israeli court) is guilty of war crimes or not. The real issue is this: why did the report on ABC TV Lateline once again use the long-discredited term "Polish concentration camp"? Is this a now ABC policy?

I emphasise that this is not a new issue. It had been raised time and time again with ABC TV and ABC Radio previously. I had raised it myself. On all occasions, ABC management on various levels had assured the complainants that ABC TV and ABC Radio would not again use this misleading and defamatory description of Nazi German concentration and extermination camps, set up by Heinrich Himmler's notorious RSHA (Reichssicherheitshauptamt) and operated by the SS in Germany and many German-occupied countries, particularly Poland in 1940-45 following the German invasion on 1 September 1939. Why then was it used in the May 12 2009 edition of Lateline?

We earnestly hope that this has been unintentional and does no mean that the ABC has reverted to describing Nazi German concentration camps as allegedly "Polish". May I remind the ABC management, editors and producer that the internationally recognised UN description, accepted by the German Government and also Israel, is "Nazi German".

Meanwhile, the reaction has been furious and snowballing. Unavoidably, because this is a slur that has greatly upset and distressed the Australian-Polish community in the ACT and, indeed, throughout Australia. I think you may expect further, and more strongly worded, complaints. Please correct this error promptly. Lateline is a fine, well presented and influential programme. It deserves much better than peddling unsubstantiated and discredited anti-Polish innuendoes. We trust this is not symptomatic of any trends influencing internal ABC culture.

Please do try to understand that these issues are, understandably, very sensitive for the Australian-Polish community - and not only. The implications of calling German death camps "Polish" are little short of horrendous. Indeed, while hopefully misguided and unintentional, the use of this offensive, intrinsically wrong terminology is barely, if at all, short of provocative. Particularly in 2009 as this year marks the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II that commenced with the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939.

The term "Polish concentration camp" clearly and unavoidably implies that Nazi German "labour", concentration and extermination camps in German-occupied Poland in 1939-45 Poland were established and operated by Poles. It also implies that Poland was a German Nazi-collaborationist nation and/or had a collaborationist regime (such as the notorious Quisling administration in Norway, the Vichy regime in France and the like).

This is simply not true. The historical truth is quite different. Poland was an ally of Australia, Great Britain and the USA. Poland was the first to resist the German ("Nazi") invasion from 1 September 1939 and fought until the last day of World War II in Europe. Poland had one of Europe's two largest and most effective armed Resistance forces in the whole of German-dominated Europe. The cost of this resistance was extremely high. Some 6,500,000 Polish citizens (half of them Polish Jews and half Christians and various other people) were killed during World War II. Of these, 650,000 died as a result of military action but the others were murdered by Nazi Germans and German-formed and German-controlled collaborationist formations. Many more were deported and murdered by Stalinist USSR in 1939-41 but that is another matter.

Please do correct the painfully misleading item in the 12 May 2009 edition of Lateline report (including the web edition) as soon as possible and ensure that such blunders are not repeated. Please do not hesitate to contact us if we could be of any assistance.

Yours sincerely,

Eugene Bajkowski

Media Spokesperson and Public Relations Officer