Ryszard Reiff

Ryszard ReiffRyszard Reiff (4 July 1923, Warsaw – 9 December 2007) was a Polish politician, lawyer, publicist and resistance fighter. He was a deputy to the Polish parliament (Sejm) during the 1968 Polish political crisis and again during the Martial law in Poland.

Biography Born in Warsaw in 1923, Reiff studied law at the University of Warsaw. After German invasion of Poland, he took part in the Polish resistance movement in World War II. He was a member of the right-leaning Konfederacja Narodu (Confederation of the Nation) underground organization and commanded one of the first units of the Uderzeniowe Bataliony Kadrowe (Cadre Strike Battalions). Later, he became a member of the Armia Krajowa (Home Army) by default as the Konfederacja Narodu merged with it, and fought against Nazi Germans near Navahrudak. As a member of Armia Krajowa, he was arrested by the Soviet NKVD, and imprisoned for two years (1944-1946).

In 1946 after the Soviet occupation, he started work as a publicist, becoming involved with the pro-communist, but also pro-Catholic faction in the Party. First, he worked in Dziś i Jutro newspaper, and from 1950 to 1953 he was a chief editor of Słowo Powszechne daily and publishing arm of the secular government-sponsored PAX Association, during the darkest years of Stalinism in Poland. A Catholic intellectual, From 1965 to 1969 and from 1980 to 1985 he was a deputy to the Polish parliament (Sejm).

On the night of 12-13 December 1981, martial law was proclaimed in Poland. and he lost his position in the council the following year. In January 1982, he was removed from his leadership of PAX by several members of the organization. From 1980 to 1985, he was once again a Sejm deputy.

With the coming fall of communism in Poland, from 1989 to 1991 he was a member of the Solidarity Citizens' Committee, and joined the Democratic Union party.

He was a chairman of the Association of Sybiraks (Polish exiles to Siberia). Between 1939 and 1941, and 1944 and 1953, around 1.8 million Poles were deported to the Russian region of Siberia, resulting in 500 000 deaths.

He died on 9 December 2007 in Warsaw.

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