Poland: The Crime of Opinion

Accused of distributing a 128-page pamphlet “detrimental to the interests of the Polish state and dealing with political and social relations in Poland,” over a dozen members of the Polish Communist party were arrested in Warsaw in April 1965.* In two trials, five were sentenced to imprisonment. The fate of the others arrested is not clear from published reports.

At the first trial, in July 1965, Karol Modjelewski was sentenced to three and-one-half years; Jacek Kuron, to t...