Tusk: Merkel is "best German politician from Polish perspective"

Nov 5, 2007, 10:59 GMT

Warsaw - The liberal victor of the Polish elections, Donald Tusk of the People's Platform (PO), considers German Chancellor Angela Merkel as the 'best German politician from the Polish perspective,' he said in an interview published in the Gazeta Wyborcza on Monday.

Merkel was opening up an opportunity to improve German-Polish relations, he said.

'Decisions and statements by German politicians who question the right historic conclusions drawn from the Second World War won't be accepted. I would like to discuss this with Chancellor Angela Merkel - the best German politician from the Polish perspective. It would be a sin not to use this opportunity,' Tusk told the paper.

He said Poland would only feel safe if 'Germany remembered its history,' although three generations had passed since the war.

The time of 'gesture politics,' as it existed 'between Kohl and Mazowiecki in Kreisau' in November 1989 was over, the PO leader said, referring to former chancellor Helmut Kohl and former premier Tadeusz Maqowiecki. Those two politicians embraced in Kreisau, in lower Silesia, a town which symbolized German resistance against former dictator Adolf Hitler.

'Now our interests are at stake and we have to defend them,' the future head of government said, confirming the Polish rejection of Russian-German plans to build a pipeline below the Baltic Sea.

The PO won 41.5 per cent of the vote in October 21 parliamentary elections, with Tusk being the candidate for the prime ministerial office.

The national-conservative Prime Minister Jaroslav Kaczynski of the Law and Justice Party (PiS) is due to step down on Monday.

During Kaczynski's time in office German-Polish relations had become strained.