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I wish to thank the Most Reverend Nuncio for the good wishes and the gracious and kind words about Poland. I also thank Your Excellency for sharing with us a reflection about the maladies of contemporary world. I personally subscribe and I think we all subscribe to many concerns and preoccupations expressed in the address of the Most Reverend Nuncio. See also: President Bronislaw Komorowski and his wife Anna meet the Diplomatic Corps

That being said, we nonetheless see and experience development and progress in their many manifestations, and this gives us all grounds to be optimistic about the direction in which the world and each of our states and home countries are developing. We know that contemporary world needs more confidence, more will to take a concerted action for the common weal, seen from a global perspective.  

2011 was a good year for Poland. This was a year of demanding tests and challenges which, as I believe, we as a state and nation managed to address. Thus, we are in favour of further strengthening of the groundwork on which the overall progress of civilization in Poland is based, in favour of openness in external relations, and friendly relations with our neighbours and with other nations of the world. We feel that there is less apprehension today and more self-assurance in place in Poland, more optimism about the prospects of the future.

October’s parliamentary elections have confirmed political stability of our country and the ability to take concerted action for the common weal, and this in spite of dispute which is only natural in a democracy. The Government appointed as a result of those elections received a political mandate to carry out reforms needed to uphold Poland’s development in a longer run. We are pleased about Poland’s current economic results: the GDP growth of more than 3.5 % in 2011 and good economic projections for 2012. We are pleased in spite of the anxiety about our external situation, and more specifically the situation in Eurozone, which does not give grounds for full optimism. In Poland, we are trying to maintain our optimistic attitude, driven by the conviction that we know what needs to be done in order to maintain economic growth. 

Also positive evaluation of our Presidency of the Council of the European Union is a source of our satisfaction. While holding it, Poland sought to preserve stability and vitality of the European integration project. Poland wants a strong Europe, strong Community institutions and a harmonious cooperation of Member States. What the European Union needs is, in our view, more will to reach agreement, more courage in changing mechanisms but also more faith that this is a project which has an illustrious future in store for it.

During the Polish Presidency, names of prominent Polish women and men featured importantly in many countries. The fact has been also mentioned by the Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, the Most Reverend Nuncio. This why the music of Chopin and Szymanowski, the composers who were formed in Poland but worked for the benefit of the whole world, was accompanying our Presidency in various places in Europe. The year 2011 was also an International Year of Marie Skłodowska-Curie in commemoration of a great Polish scientist whose pioneering discoveries in the area of physics and chemistry paved the way in Europe to women’s academic and scientific progress. Ignacy Jan Paderewski, a great pianist by whose portrait and piano you have passed on entering this room, in his inauguration speech as a Polish Prime Minister in the trying times soon after the First World War noted that it was not only warriors who fought for Poland but also “the knights of the word, colour and sounds, the champions of thought, science and knowledge”.

The year 2011 will go down in the annals of history. This will be due to developments which have been termed “the Arab spring” world-wide. For us, Poles, they have been a reminder of man’s unrelenting yearning for a life lived in dignity and for greater freedom, a reminder of aspirations shared by individuals and whole societies, concerning better living standards. For Poles, and especially the Solidarity-generation, these events were like a reminiscence of our Polish 1980 and then 1989. This is why the developments in North Africa evoked among us feelings of empathy and solidarity. In spite of frequently dramatic turns that those processes were taking, we are confident about their successful result and wish the nations of the whole region of North Africa and Middle East every success in the work which has been courageously undertaken.

For Polish diplomacy, the previous year was a year of an intense work featuring many important events in external relations. For me personally, this was also a year abundant in international contacts. Among other events, Poland hosted the Summit Meeting of the Weimar Triangle, the Summit of Presidents of Central European States, which was attended by twenty Heads of States from the region and United States President Barack Obama was the guest of honour. Poland also played host to the Eastern Partnership Summit. The previous year afforded many opportunities for meetings and talks with Presidents, Prime Ministers, Members of Parliament, diplomats, representatives of international organizations, economic life, important think-tanks, and of NGO’s dealing with various social problems. I wish to take this opportunity to thank everyone for their input in our joint actions and for the cooperation we enjoyed.

I am grateful that so many people were willing to share with me and with Poland their observations and remarks pointing to the specific things that Poland could do in various areas of international life, also in its bilateral relations.

The experience of the last year heightens the awareness of the difficulties that we are facing as nations, regions and the entire international community. At the same time, the experience gathered suggests that future is in our hands and that if that the problems that beset us will be surmountable if we do not cease to work. To this end, it is necessary to reject the temptation of unilateralism, of nationalistic attitudes, and the logics juxtaposing “us” and “them” in a way in which the success of the one side is always at the expense of the other.

There is no other way to overcome antagonizing differences, difficulties in bilateral relations or problems regional or global than through dialogue, openness and frankness which build confidence and lead to a sound consensus.

For twenty years now, we have invariably seen progress in the good-neighbourly relations with states of our region. Poland knows how to forge relations between nations in a friendly fashion. I am happy to see the Polish ability to turn-around bilateral relations which were once conflict-ridden and full of dramatic experiences and were then transformed into relations based on openness and dialogue, exchange of goods and of thoughts, opening up such perspectives where a neighbour is going to be noticed and appreciated, where those with whom we have been living together in a neighbourhood for many centuries, are now well liked and valued.