Sławomir Cenckiewicz (born 20 July 1971) is a Polish historian and journalist.

Life

A former employee of the

Institute of National Remembrance The Institute of National Remembrance – Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation ( pl, Instytut Pamięci Narodowej – Komisja Ścigania Zbrodni przeciwko Narodowi Polskiemu, abbreviated IPN) is a Polish state resea ...

, since 2016 Cenckiewicz is president of the

Polish Army The Land Forces () are the land forces of the Polish Armed Forces. They currently contain some 62,000 active personnel and form many components of the European Union and NATO deployments around the world. Poland's recorded military history stre ...

's History Office. He gained much media attention following the 2008 publication of a book he co-authored with

Piotr Gontarczyk Piotr Gontarczyk (born 29 April 1970 in Żyrardów, Poland) is a poles, Polish historian with a doctor (title), doctorate in history and political science. He is employed by the Polish Institute of National Remembrance. He specializes in the W ...

, ''SB a Lech Wałęsa. Przyczynek do biografii'' (The SB and Lech Wałęsa: Contribution to a Biography), about

Lech Wałęsa Lech Wałęsa (; ; born 29 September 1943) is a Polish statesman, dissident, and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, who served as the President of Poland between 1990 and 1995. After winning the 1990 election, Wałęsa became the first democrati ...

's service as an

informant An informant (also called an informer or, as a slang term, a “snitch”) is a person who provides privileged information about a person or organization to an agency. The term is usually used within the law-enforcement world, where informant ...

of the communist ''

Służba Bezpieczeństwa The Ministry of Public Security ( pl, Ministerstwo Bezpieczeństwa Publicznego), commonly known as UB or later SB, was the secret police, intelligence and counter-espionage agency operating in the Polish People's Republic. From 1945 to 1954 it w ...

''. ''SB a Lech Wałęsa. Przyczynek do biografii'', Warszawa 2008, [co-author

Gontarczyk and Cenckiewicz argued that in the 1970s the Solidarity (Polish trade union) leader and former President of Poland

was a secret informant for the Polish communist secret police, the ''

'' (''SB''). Cenckiewicz is a graduate of the

Gdańsk University Gdańsk ( , also ; ; csb, Gduńsk;Stefan Ramułt, ''Słownik języka pomorskiego, czyli kaszubskiego'', Kraków 1893, Gdańsk 2003, ISBN 83-87408-64-6. , Johann Georg Theodor Grässe, ''Orbis latinus oder Verzeichniss der lateinischen Benen ...

History Department. His main fields of expertise are the modern history of Poland, including the opposition in the

Polish People's Republic The Polish People's Republic ( pl, Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa, PRL) was a country in Central Europe that existed from 1947 to 1989 as the predecessor of the modern Republic of Poland. With a population of approximately 37.9 million ne ...

and the

Polish diaspora The Polish diaspora comprises Poles and people of Polish heritage or origin who live outside Poland. The Polish diaspora is also known in modern Polish as ''Polonia'', the name for Poland in Latin and many Romance languages. There are roughly 20, ...

. He was habilitated as a doctor of history at the

Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw (UKSW) (Latin: ''Universitas Cardinalis Stephani Wyszyński Varsoviae'') is a Polish state university created on the basis of the Academy of Catholic Theology in Warsaw. UKSW is a public university t ...

. Cenckiewicz has worked with the

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

-based Polonia Aid Foundation Trust (2000 and 2004),

Kościuszko Foundation The Kosciuszko Foundation is a charitable foundation based in New York City. It was created by Stephen Mizwa to fund programs that promote Polish-American intellectual and artistic exchange. History The Polish American Scholarship Committee wa ...

(2000), and the Chicago-based Foundation for Free Speech (2005). Cenckiewicz opposes a renewed

Jedwabne Jedwabne (; yi, יעדוואבנע, ''Yedvabna'') is a town in northeast Poland, in Łomża County of Podlaskie Voivodeship, with 1,942 inhabitants (2002). It is notable for the Jedwabne pogrom of 10 July 1941, during the World War II German oc ...

exhumation. Cenckiewicz identifies as a follower of

Traditionalist Catholicism Traditionalist Catholicism is the set of beliefs, practices, customs, traditions, liturgical forms, devotions, and presentations of Catholic teaching that existed in the Catholic Church before the liberal reforms of the Second Vatican Council ...

and has criticized

Pope Francis Pope Francis ( la, Franciscus; it, Francesco; es, link=, Francisco; born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 17 December 1936) is the head of the Catholic Church. He has been the bishop of Rome and sovereign of the Vatican City State since 13 March 2013. ...

and his positions for what Cenckiewicz says has hastened secularization in Catholic countries.

Books authored

* ''Oczami bezpieki: szkice i materiały z dziejów aparatu bezpieczeństwa PRL'', Kraków: Wyd. Arcana, 2005, * ''Tadeusz Katelbach (1897-1977): biografia polityczna'', Wydawnictwo LTW, Warszawa 2005, =doctoral dissertation= * ''SB a Lech Wałęsa. Przyczynek do biografii'', Warszawa 2008, [co-authored with

]. * ''Sprawa Lecha Wałęsy'', Poznań: Zysk i s-ka, 2008, . * ''Śladami bezpieki i partii. Rozprawy - Źródła - Publicystyka'', Wydawnictwo LTW, Łomianki, 2009. * ''Gdański Grudzień '70'', Wydawnictwo IPN, Gdańsk-Warszawa 2009., * ''Anna Solidarność. Życie i działalność Anny Walentynowicz na tle epoki (1929-2010)'', Zysk i S-ka, 2010. * ''Długie ramię Moskwy. Wywiad wojskowy Polski Ludowej 1943-1991 (wprowadzenie do syntezy)'', Zysk i S-ka, 2011. * ''Lech Kaczyński. Biografia polityczna 1949–2005'', Zysk i S-ka, 2013, (other authors: Anna Piekarska, Adam Chmielecki, Janusz Kowalski) * ''Wałęsa. Człowiek z teczki'', Zysk i S-ka, 2013, * ''Atomowy szpieg. Ryszard Kukliński i wojna wywiadów'', Wydawnictwo Zysk i S-ka, Poznań 2014

References

External links

* http://www.slawomircenckiewicz.pl 1971 births Living people Controversies in Poland 21st-century Polish historians Polish male non-fiction writers People associated with the Institute of National Remembrance University of Gdańsk alumni Polish traditionalist Catholics Academic staff of Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń {{Poland-historian-stub