Polish President who said homosexuality will destroy human race dies in plane crash
Polish President Lech Kaczynski who once said that the promotion of homosexuality would lead to the eventual destruction of the human race has died in a plane crash near Smolensk in Russia. Kaczynski’s right wing Law and Justice party are in an alliance with the British Conservative party in the European Parliament. Gordon Brown and David Cameron paid tribute to Kaczynski.
Regional report that 87 people were killed in the incident and the local government have said there were no survivors and Kaczynski has been confirmed among the dead. Also on board the plane was the former Polish deputy prime minister, Jaruga-Nowacka, one of the country’s most outspoken advocates of gay rights.
Lech Kaczynski and his twin brother Jarosław Kaczyński are major figures in right wing, homophobic Polish politics. Jaroslaw was until recently the prime minister of Poland. Lech had previously been the Mayor of Warsaw and reached international notoriety because of repeatedly banning gay pride marches from taking place in the city.
Kaczynski was accused of homophobia when in 2007 as President he was challenged over this decision, and said: ” “If that kind of approach to sexual life were to be promoted on a grand scale, the human race would disappear.
“Imagine what grand changes would occur in mores if the traditional links between men and women were set aside.”
Following the 2009 European Parliament elections, David Cameron’s Conservative party joined Kaczynski’s Law and Justice Party in a new right wing alliance within the Parliament.
Mr Cameron was widely criticised for inviting a colleague of the Kaczynski twins to speak to the 2009 Conservative party conference.
Following the crash Mr Cameron said Mr Kaczynski was a “very brave Polish patriot who stood up for freedom”.
“He suffered hugely under communism and always stood up for his beliefs, and for his great faith in his country,” he added.
British prime minister Gordon Brown said: “I think the whole world will be saddened and in sorrow as a result of the tragic death in a plane crash of President Kaczynski and his wife Maria and the party that were with them,” he said.
“We know the difficulties that Poland has gone through, the sacrifices that he himself made as part of the Solidarity movement. ”
Today, Smolensk regional governor Sergei Antufiev told Russian TV: “as it was preparing for landing, the Polish president’s aircraft did not make it to the landing strip.”
“According to preliminary reports, it got caught up in the tops of trees, fell to the ground and broke up into pieces. There are no survivors in that crash.
“We are clarifying how many people there were in the [Polish] delegation. According to preliminary reports, 85 members of the delegation and the crew.”
