Putin invites Tusk to Katyn commemoration

7th February 2010

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Poland’s fraught and emotional relations with Russia may have taken an unexpected turn for the better after Moscow invited the Polish prime minister to attend ceremonies marking the 70th-anniversary of the Katyn Massacre.

In April, both Donald Tusk and his Russian peer, Vladimir Putin, will attend a memorial service for the estimated 20,000 Poles murdered on the orders of Stalin in the spring of 1940.

“Prime Minister (Putin) invited him to jointly visit Katyn," Mr Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov, while Mr Tusk’s office provided more detail.

“Prime Minister Putin underlined that he is aware of how important the Katyn issue is for Poles. Prime Minister Putin said: 'I believe t ...