I could not imagine that there will be times when international politics are discussed on football stadiums and 'hooligan' banners are treated as diplomatic notes. Well, there are a lot of surprises in politics and media. This is probably the first case in the history of international relations when stadium graffiti affects international relationship and causes hysteria among the media, especially Lithuanian ones. Suddenly, these marginal and loutish words were exaggerated to such extraordinary level, as if it was at least a terrorist attack. A giant wave of harsh criticism of Polish-Lithuanian relations smashed the media. Poles of the Vilnius Region were hit the most. Peculiar demands of apologies were a complement of everything. Is it just an incident?

There are no incidents in politics and diplomacy, because politics is just a game of interests controlled more or less by the provocations of various services. And certainly it was a provocation. Silly hooligans acted only as a tool and their banner was a cause to start the persecution of Poland and of Lithuanian Poles. Someone wants to kill two birds with one stone. Weird unity and convergence of Lithuanian nationalist-minded politicians' and journalists' comments, overblowing the subject and keeping it in a public space, showed how well staged the show was. Observing the show one can only wonder what the reason of this unity and convergence is.

Poles of Lithuania are the reason. It is obvious. Why was it done? In order to cover (with the help of the media) dirty conscience of Lithuanian authorities and journalists in the matter of constant discrimination of Polish minority in this country. And this is a real scandal on an international scale. Because has anyone ever seen in the modern Europe, which calls for the respect of linguistic, cultural and ethnic diversity, another state where one could not write his or her name in an original form, i.e. in a mother tongue; where the usage of bilingual informational plates is prohibited even in the places where national minority constitutes 80 percent of district population; where people are fined for using the language of the national minority they belong to? There is no other state in the EU apart Lithuania reigned by official chauvinism. Now, during the Lithuanian Presidency of the EU, authorities find every reason convenient to drown this shameful for Lithuania truth. So that there would be no questions regarding the persecution of Poles of Vilnius Region on the European forum; so it would be possible to say 'they do not like us'. And this is the task of the provocatively and artificially overblown Poznań incident. An this is the truth of this event.

It is sad, but provocateurs and journalists ideally used the stadium banner for anti-Polish campaign and deterioration of anyway cool relations between the two states. It is important that this insidiously dropped catch would not be swallowed by ordinary people for whom political provocations are not that obvious. After all there is no need to demonstrate the value of good neighbourly relations to anyone. Politicians should not forget, that football stadium is not an appropriate place for politics. And media should not spread hysteria, create prejudices, or take part in the provocations of the special services, as this is not their purpose.

Dr. Bogusław Rogalski, political scientist

ECR advisor for international affairs at the European Parliament