The bodies of former Polish president Lech Kaczynski and his wife have been removed from their tomb in Krakow, the first of more than 80 exhumations planned on prominent Poles killed in a airplane crash in Russia in 2010.
The exhumations that began late on Monday are part of a new investigation into the crash ordered by Poland’s ruling party, Law and Justice, which is led by former Polish prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the late president’s twin brother.
Post-mortems are to be carried out to determine the cause of the deaths and of the crash, identify all the remains and check for explosives, as some of Jaroslaw Kaczynski’s followers claim that a planned blast downed the aircraft, killing all 96 onboard.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski has cast doubt on earlier investigations — carried out by both Poland and Russia — which concluded that the crash was an accident caused primarily by pilot error on approach to landing in dense fog.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski has for years encouraged a conspiracy theory suggesting Russia carried out an assassination with the support, or at least the consent, of then-Polish prime minister Donald Tusk, who is now the president of the European Council.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski wants to take Tusk, to court and is seeking evidence against him.
“There will not be a free Poland, a truly free Poland, without the truth, without a proper honoring of those who died, without a closure of this case which has cast such a long shadow on our national and social life,” Jaroslaw Kaczynski said on Thursday.
The bodies of Lech Kaczynski and his wife, Maria Kaczynska, were removed from their alabaster tomb at the Wawel Cathedral in Krakow, the resting place of many of Poland’s kings and writers, PAP news agency reported.
The remains were to be taken to a forensics laboratory at Krakow’s Jagiellonian University for a series of tests, including computer tomography and DNA tests.
Scientists will also look for the presence of explosives to check the belief held by many Kaczynski supporters that the aircraft disintegrated in mid-air in an intentional explosion.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not