Professor Krzysztof Ruchniewicz has fired Hanna Radziejowska, the head of the institute’s Berlin office, amid accusations of undermining trust by spreading misleading claims about the institute’s projects.
Changes at the Pilecki Institute
During a press conference on August 14, Prof. Krzysztof Ruchniewicz announced that he had dismissed Hanna Radziejowska from her role as director of the Berlin branch. The institute released a statement citing “objective reasons.” It said that “Hanna Radziejowska’s recent activities had severely undermined her employer’s trust. Her posts on social media and in traditional media contained over‑interpretations and insinuations about the Institute’s projects, exceeding the boundaries of the employee‑employer relationship. In particular, sharing internal correspondence with third parties and expressing concerns about the Institute’s activities without prior internal discussion” was unacceptable. The successor to Radziejowska will be named next week, and the Berlin office will continue to operate uninterrupted until then.
The Controversial Seminar Planning Case
In early August an article in “Rzeczpospolita” revealed that the Pilecki Institute intended to organize a seminar on the return of cultural goods from Poland to Germany, with Prof. Krzysztof Ruchniewicz allegedly overseeing the project. According to the paper, in July the Berlin branch director, Hanna Radziejowska, sent a letter to the Minister of Culture and to the chargé d’affaires at the German Embassy in Berlin, noting that the Institute’s director had expected a series of seminars and proposed, among others, a seminar on the return of cultural goods to Germany, Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, and private Jewish‑origin property. The proposal was to be carried out jointly with the Ministry of Culture. The document cited indicates that “Professor Ruchniewicz’s proposal, who also serves as a Polish‑German relations envoy, contradicts Polish state policy and raises serious concerns about potential negative consequences for both the Ministry of Culture and the Pilecki Institute.”
Dispute at the Pilecki Institute
The institute refuted the newspaper’s allegations and accused Berlin branch staff of lying. An official statement read: “The Pilecki Institute, together with the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, is organizing an international seminar series on provenance research of Polish cultural goods plundered during World War II. The Institute has never planned meetings that would lead to the transfer of any Polish cultural goods to any legal or natural persons, in contradiction to the false claims made by Hanna Radziejowska.” The Ministry of Culture also released a comment emphasising that “The Pilecki Institute does not conduct, nor has it ever conducted, discussions on the restitution of cultural goods.” Nonetheless, Hanna Radziejowska and her deputy from the Berlin branch, Marcin Falikowski, wrote a comment in “Rzeczpospolita” on August 8, challenging the institute’s statements. They reiterated that the seminar idea originated from Prof. Ruchniewicz during an online meeting and that the proposal, made in the presence of two team members who signed the note to the Ministry, could have taken on a political character. Both parties confirm the content of their conversation and do not retract their statements.
