Both Sides Expel Envoys as U.S.-Poland Chill Deepens

Relations between the United States and Poland, which began to improve late last year, plunged into a deep chill Friday when Warsaw expelled two U.S. diplomats and Washington retaliated by ordering four Polish officials to leave the United States.

The unusual four-for-two U.S. response followed within hours of Poland’s expulsion of the American diplomats, accused of inciting an illegal May Day demonstration near the southern city of Krakow.

State Department spokesman Edward P. Djerejian bluntly described the U.S. move as “retaliation for the unwarranted Polish action.” He said the decision to expel twice as many Poles as Americans was intended “to express our grave displeasure not only with the unjustified expulsion of our diplomats, but also with the Polish government’s bald fabrication of a story to justify their expulsion.”

Tit-for-tat expulsions are a common diplomatic practice, but they are usually done in equal numbers and the announcements frequently avoid the word “retaliate.”

The official Polish press agency PAP said the two Americans, William Harwood, 38, a first secretary at the U.S. Embassy in Warsaw, and David Hopper, 32, consul general in Krakow, were among a group of 15 people who allegedly shouted slogans, waved banners and passed out leaflets during an illegal May Day demonstration Wednesday in Krakow’s steel-making suburb of Nowa Huta.

U.S. officials, both at the State Department and the embassy, denied that Harwood and Hopper were doing anything more than watching the demonstration as part of their normal diplomatic duties. Washington said said the two were manhandled by Polish security police.

“This incident, like the gross mistreatment of our defense attache and his wife in February, indicates that the Polish government is either unable or unwilling to require its internal security apparatus to observe the norms of civilized behavior,” Djerejian said.

“Rather than apologizing, as the actual facts of the matter require, the Polish government has chosen to adopt the internal security apparatus’ false account of the incident in what can only be characterized as a crude attempt to damage further the bilateral (U.S.-Polish) relationship,” he added.

The ranks of the four Polish diplomats expelled are comparable to those of Harwood and Hopper. They are Boguslaw Maciborski of the Polish Embassy in Washington and three officials of the consulate in Chicago, Romuald Derylo, Jozef Kaminski and Stanislaw Zawadzki.

Ties Cooled in 1981

U.S.-Polish relations, decidedly chilly following Poland’s imposition of martial law in 1981, had begun to warm late last year when Warsaw released many dissidents from prison and lifted some domestic restrictions. In response, the United States dropped its opposition to Polish entry into the International Monetary Fund.

But relations took a turn for the worse in February when Warsaw expelled U.S. military attache Col. Frederick Myer and his wife, Barbara, for allegedly taking pictures in a restricted area, a charge Washington denied. The State Department responded by accusing the Poles of physically abusing Myer’s wife. Washington subsequently expelled a Polish defense attache and warned that the United States would take harsher action if other U.S. diplomats were ejected.

Djerejian said the two Americans produced diplomatic identification cards when challenged by Polish security police in Nowa Huta. Nevertheless, they were ordered to enter an unmarked police car.

“When they protested violation of their rights under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, Hopper was pushed, struck and kicked and forced into an unmarked police vehicle,” Djerejian said. “En route to the police station, the policemen holding their documents denied that they were diplomats and said that they would be accused of throwing stones at police vehicles. Upon arrival at the police station, they were held for 20 minutes, escorted to the door and released.”

Protests in Warsaw

As Polish television reported the expulsion Friday evening, riot police in Warsaw’s Old Town area used truncheons to disperse a demonstration of several thousand supporters of the outlawed Solidarity trade union who gathered to mark the anniversary of Poland’s 1791 constitution, a liberal bill of rights suppressed by a Russian invasion and, ultimately, by the complete dismemberment of Poland.

The crowd offered no resistance, but police nevertheless chased and beat dozens of the demonstrators as they attempted to flee, in the harshest action against a Solidarity gathering in the capital in more than a year.

In some instances, riot-equipped police sprinted after demonstrators, knocking them to the pavement and flailing them with truncheons before dragging them to waiting police vans. Two officers held one young woman by her long hair and beat her as she screamed.

In Krakow, riot police used clubs to break up a similar demonstration. Solidarity sources in Krakow reported that police attacked protesters who were marching following a Mass attended by an estimated 7,000 persons.

Norman Kempster reported from Washington and Robert Gillette from Warsaw.