page_title: Czesław Kiszczak
section_title: Interior minister
hierarchical_section_title: Czesław Kiszczak / Interior minister
caption_attribution_description: For documentary purposes the German Federal Archive often retained the original image captions, which may be erroneous, biased, obsolete or politically extreme. Berlin, Erich Honecker empfängt Waffengeneral Kiszczak ADN-ZB/Zimmermann 29.6.88 Berlin: Gespräch im ZK Der Generalsekretär des ZK der SED und Vorsitzende des Staatsrates der DDR, Erich Honecker, empfing das Mitglied des Politbüros des ZK der PVAP, den Minister des Innern der VR Polen, Waffengeneral Czeslaw Kiszczak (l.), zu einem freundschaftlichen Gespräch. Daran nahm das Mitglied des Politbüros des ZK der SED Armeegeneral Erich Mielke (2.v.r.) , Minister für Staatssicherheit, teil. Abgebildete Personen: Mielke, Erich: Minister für Staatssicherheit, Armeegeneral, Politbüro des Zentralkomitees (ZK) der SED, DDR (GND 118977490) Honecker, Erich: Staatsratsvorsitzender, Generalsekretär des ZK der SED, DDR (GND 118553399)
context_page_description: Czesław Jan Kiszczak was a Polish general, communist-era interior minister and prime minister.
  In 1981 he played a key role in imposing martial law and suppression of the Solidarity movement in Poland. But eight years later he presided over the country's transition to democracy as its last communist prime minister and a co-chairman of the Round Table conference, in which officials of the ruling Polish United Workers' Party faced the democratic opposition leaders. The conference led to the reconciliation with and reinstatement of Solidarity, the 1989 elections, and the formation of Poland's first non-communist government since 1945.
context_section_description: In July 1981 Kiszczak was appointed minister of internal affairs. The Ministry of Internal Affairs, together with the Ministry of National Defense, were among the biggest and most powerful administrations in Poland, responsible for the police force, the secret police, government protection, confidential communications, supervision of local governments, correctional facilities and fire services.
  In that position, Kiszczak participated in the preparation and implementation of the martial law that was declared in Poland on 13 December 1981. He became a member of the Military Council of National Salvation, a quasi-government administering Poland during the martial law (1981–83). In 1982 he became a deputy member of the Politburo of the Polish United Workers' Party and a full member in 1986. From December 1981 until June 1989 Kiszczak was the second most important person in Poland, after General Wojciech Jaruzelski, the nation's top leader. Together they orchestrated the crackdown aimed at crushing the Solidarity, the Eastern Bloc's first non-communist labor union movement. Martial law included the mass roundup and internment of Solidarity activists, curfews and other harsh measures.
  Generals Kiszczak and Jaruzelski later insisted that they were imposing martial law to stave off a possible Soviet-led invasion in response to the Solidarity uprising, as it happened after a reform movement in Czechoslovakia in 1968 (the Prague Spring). "I saved the country from terrible troubles", Kiszczak said years later. But critics claimed Jaruzelski and Kiszczak were doing Moscow's bidding in a brutal crackdown that included the shooting deaths of nine protesting miners by the police during the Pacification of Wujek operation.
  As internal affairs minister, Kiszczak was responsible for the coverup of Grzegorz Przemyk's death, after his severe beating by two police officers in 1983. The court files of the case preserved his handwritten note ordering the prosecution to "only stick to one version of the investigation - the paramedics", which resulted in a doctor and a paramedic falsely convicted and imprisoned for over a year as part of the cover-up as part of a show trial. In 1984 Kiszczak granted financial awards to the policemen who coordinated the cover-up. During the trial in postcommunist Poland in 1997, one of the officers, who had participated in the beating, was eventually brought to justice, another acquitted, but Kiszczak was not on trial and avoided any punishment for his role in masterminding the coverup of the crime.
  At the end of the 1980s, with the huge geopolitical changes brought by four years of Gorbachev's perestroika in the Soviet Union and with Polish economy deteriorating, Kiszczak negotiated the Polish Round Table Agreement with the opposition that led to the renewed recognition of Solidarity and the terms for the 1989 elections. Solidarity candidates went on to win nearly all the seats in the National Assembly that they were permitted to contest.
  Kiszczak was appointed prime minister in 1989, but Solidarity refused to enter a communist-led government. Within a few weeks, to avert further labor unrest ignited by soaring food prices, he resigned and joined a Solidarity-dominated coalition as deputy prime minister and interior minister. He served until mid-1990, when he retired from political life.
caption: Kiszczak - SED chief Erich Honecker meeting 1988
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