Poland is looking for an ally in Greece for reparations from Germany for World War II

On Tuesday, senior Polish officials said they plan to expand the campaign to get massive reparations from Germany for World War II, turning to Greece and other European countries as potential allies.

Poland last year officially demanded compensation in the amount of $1.3 trillion – an amount close to the size of its annual gross domestic product – while Greece is claiming more than $300 billion in damages caused by the occupying Nazi Germans during World War II.

Germany claims damage claims were settled after the war, but Arkadiusz Mularczyk, Poland’s deputy foreign minister, said on Tuesday his government in Warsaw would cooperate with other countries affected by Nazi occupation.

“Countries individually have failed to achieve justice for the victims… Therefore, we must work together to achieve justice,” Mularczyk said at a reparations conference in Athens, organized jointly with the Polish Foreign Ministry.

“The damage and losses are undeniable,” he said. “The data is undeniable … 5.2 million Poles were killed. After the war, the population of Poland decreased by 11.4 million people, and 2.1 million Polish citizens were used as slave labor” .

Prokopis Pavlopoulos, a law professor who served as president of Greece from 2015 to 2020, said Greek claims were revived after German reunification in 1990, arguing that Germany’s post-war partition was cited as a reason for limiting compensation.

“Of course Germany has apologized for its actions, acting with integrity,” Pavlopoulos said. “German officials always attend events dedicated to [зверствам нацистов во Второй мировой войне]. This is commendable, but it does not negate the claim for compensation. These requirements exist.

Greece’s demands were officially renewed in 2010. Over the following years, the topic of reparations became a favorite skate politiciansuntil New Democracy, which came in 2019, declared that it considered this issue resolved, signing in 2023 a waiver of reparations.

[AP].

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