On the eve of presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney's visit to their country, conservative Poles are asking the candidate to visit the grave of late Polish president Lech Kaczynsky.
Kaczynsky, who died in a plane crash in 2010, was a noted figure in the Solidarity movement who maintained his tough rhetoric on Russia until his death.
The website niezalezna.pl and Polish MP Christopher Szczerski of the conservative Law and Justice party are encouraging Polish citizens to fill out the Romney campaign's' scheduling request form to ask that Romney make the stop.
Here, verbatim, is the text they suggest (it's in English on their site):
On the 10th of April 2010 Polish president prof. Lech Kaczyński tragically died in the crash of the Polish air force Tupolev in Smoleńsk. Together with him many outstanding Poles lost their lives: military commanders, the Polish central bank chief, members of parliament. To this day Polish citizens do not know the exact cause of the crash and therefore the reason why their president and military commanders died. The Russians destroyed the wreck of the plane, the plane’s flight recorders are being kept in Moscow.
Thousands of Poles in Poland but also in the US ask for the appointment of an international commission, who could investigate – in an independent and thorough manner – the causes of this enormous tragedy. Investigations conducted so far by independent experts – also from the US - have come to the unambiguous conclusion that the government plane with president Lech Kaczynski on board crashed on April 10th 2010 for other reasons than those presented by the commission authorized by Russian president Vladimir Putin. According to the independent experts, there is evidence that the crash was caused by two explosions on board of the plane.
We appeal therefore to You, Sir, to support during Your visit to Poland the efforts of thousands of Poles – and among them many American citizens – to elucidate the cause of death of the Polish president and many Polish generals. Let Your visit to the grave of president Lech Kaczyński be an expression of Your concern for justice and the friendship between Poland and the United States of America. It would be an unequivocal, clear gesture not only towards American Poles but Poland as a whole.
[h/t Michal Kolanko]