Whereas the United States and Poland are close allies,
with a shared bond of history, friendship, and international
cooperation;
Whereas Polish immigrants were among the first Jamestown
settlers, and Casimir Pulaski immigrated to the United States to fight in the
Revolutionary War;
Whereas more than 9,000,000 Americans of Polish descent
now reside in the United States, bringing vitality to major metropolitan areas
such as Chicago, Detroit, and New York City;
Whereas Polish-Americans have been leaders in all walks of
American life;
Whereas the American people stood in support of the
Solidarity movement as it fought against the oppression of the communist
government of Poland through peaceful means, eventually leading to Solidarity
members being elected to office in open democratic elections held on June 4,
1989, events that helped spark the movement to democracy throughout eastern
Europe;
Whereas Poland joined the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization (NATO) in 1999, joined the European Union in 2004, and has
contributed to United States and NATO operations in Iraq and
Afghanistan;
Whereas Poland has enjoyed a thriving and prosperous free
market democracy since the end of the Cold War;
Whereas the President of Poland Lech Kaczynski and 95
other people, including Poland's First Lady, the deputy foreign minister,
dozens of members of Parliament, the chiefs of the army and navy, and the
president of the national bank, were tragically killed in a plane crash in
western Russia on April 10, 2010;
Whereas President Kaczynski and his colleagues were
traveling to Katyn, Russia for a memorial service to mark the 70th anniversary
of the Soviet secret police killing of more than 20,000 Polish officers,
prisoners, and intellectuals who were captured after the Soviet Union invaded
Poland in 1939;
Whereas Anna Walentynowicz, the former dock worker whose
firing in 1980 sparked the Solidarity strike that ultimately overthrew the
communist government of Poland, was also killed in the crash;
Whereas Ryszard Kaczorowski, who served as Poland’s final
president in exile before the country’s return to democracy, also perished in
the crash;
Whereas Chicago suffered the loss of a respected artist
when Wojciech Seweryn, whose father was killed in Katyn, died in the
crash;
Whereas Mr. Seweryn recently completed a memorial to the
victims of Katyn at St. Adalbert Cemetery in Niles, Illinois, which President
Kaczynski planned to visit in May;
Whereas President Barack Obama said, the loss is
devastating to Poland, to the United States, and to the world. President
Kaczynski was a distinguished statesman who played a key role in the Solidarity
movement, and he was widely admired in the United States as a leader dedicated
to advancing freedom and human dignity.
;
Whereas Former Solidarity leader and ex-president Lech
Walesa said, “Today, we lost part of our intellectual elite in a plane crash.
It will take a long time until the wounds of our democracy are healed.”;
and
Whereas thousands of Poles gathered in the center of
Warsaw and elsewhere around the world on Saturday to mourn those killed in the
crash and affirm their continued solidarity with the people of Poland: Now,
therefore, be it
That the Senate—
(1)expresses its
deepest sympathies to the people of Poland and the families of those who
perished for their profound loss;
(2)expresses strong
and continued solidarity with the people of Poland and Polish-American
communities in the United States; and
(3)expresses
unwavering support for the Government of Poland as it works to address the loss
of many key public officials.