Polish war hero to be exhumed

A Second World War murder mystery with a cast of characters including Winston Churchill, the British double agent Kim Philby and Joseph Stalin could be solved after the Polish government called for the body of one its national heroes, General Wladyslaw Sikorski, to be exhumed. Sikorski, the leader of Poland's war-time government in exile, died 65 years ago this month when his plane plunged into the sea off Gibraltar. Ever since, conspiracy theories have abounded that it was foul play.

The reasons cited for a British intervention in 1943 are that Sikorski, who was a defender of the Polish national cause, threatened to derail Britain's relationship with the Soviet Union, and that this caused Churchill to order his assassination. Added to this is the fact that Philby, who was in charge of British intelligence operations in the territory, was in Gibraltar at the time.

Poland's president, Lech Kaczynski, and his prime minister, Donald Tusk, have lent their support to exhuming the general's body from his tomb in Wawel Cathedral in Krakow. Said the president: "The tragic circumstances of the death of General Sikorski should be explained."

However, if there ever was a plot, many believe a more likely explanation is that Stalin, incensed by Sikorski's demand for an investigation into the Katyn massacre of Polish officers by Soviet troops, was behind it. The Soviet leader's accusers say that Sikorski's plane was left unguarded on the runway at Gibraltar, and could easily have been sabotaged. They also point out that on the day of the crash, July 4, 1943, a plane carrying the Soviet ambassador Ivan Maisky and a small retinue of Soviet troops was parked next to the doomed Polish leader's aircraft, making sabotage all the easier.