Action Report

Swiftsource

Warsaw, Poland, Friday, May 18, 2007 4:37 pm

David Irving exhibit, talk in Warsaw, Poland, cancelled under pressure

EXHIBITION chief Grzegorz Guzowski, head of the Ars Polona company, today [Friday May 18, 2007] ordered the immediate closure of David Irving's stand, Focal Point Publications, on the third day of the Warsaw Book Fair, and the cancellation of his planned lecture (on the political problems of writing modern history) in the Mickiewicz Hall of the Soviet-era Palace of Culture this evening.

He explained to Mr Irving that they had come under pressure from outside bodies. [A website source states: "The ban was initiated by the Director of Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum Piotr Cywinski, who apparently complained ."]

Mr Guzowski was extremely courteous and apologetic to the author, but made plain that they were not prepared to resist these pressures. Mr Guzowski undertook to reimburse all fees, airfares and expenses incurred by Mr Irving, whose Focal Point stand was a popular draw for two days with many visitors from Eastern European countries. During this final morning at the stand he had already recorded four television interviews with Polish news corporations.

He signed several publishing deals with eastern European publishers, including one with a Danzig-based Polish publisher, for his explosive memoirs and for the Heinrich Himmler biography on which he is working.

Intervening in a television interview being given by Mr Guzowski in front of the stand, as security officials hurried to pack up its contents, Mr Irving said, "It is ironic that Poland, whose freedom Britain has twice fought to preserve, is now surrendering to such outside bodies once again."


A NOTE on press accuracy. The Scotsman reported on May 19, 2007: "Historian David Irving, a convicted holocaust denier, was escorted out of an international book fair in Warsaw where he was planning to display his books, Polish organisers said on Saturday. "We asked him to leave," said Grzegorz Guzowski, the book fair organiser. He said Irving's publishers did not send materials detailing his work to the fair until a few hours before the deadline."

THE Austrian arrest warrant, dated 1989, was for Wiederbetätigung, not "holocaust denial". As for the Warsaw Book Show, the Focal Point booking for the exhibition was submitted on April 6, 2007 and accepted the following day. The application provided this catalogue description: "We publish David Irving's world-famous books and biographies. His Hitler biography was a best-seller in Poland and worldwide." [Click to view]

 

Mr Irving's March 2007 visit to Auschwitz and Birkenau, Poland.
Auschwitz Museum commandant Piotr M. A. Cywinski admits he notified Polish police about "an intended violation" by Mr Irving of a Polish law on free speech [note incidentally the three fake watch towers in the photo image at the foot of the Auschwitz press release]
When Auschwitz banned BBC filming a TV documentary with Mr Irving