On 10 April 2010, 96 people, including Polish President Lech Kaczyński and First Lady Maria Kaczyńska, top government officials, representatives of social organisations and churches, military commanders, and the flight crew, died in the air disaster. Foreign service employees, including senior officials of Ministry of Foreign Affairs, were also among its victims.

On the event’s anniversary, Deputy Minister Władysław Teofil Bartoszewski laid wreaths at the President Lech Kaczyński statue and the Monument to the Victims of the Smolensk Tragedy of 2010 on Piłsudski Square. At the same time, Deputy Minister Robert Kupiecki paid his respects to the deceased at the monument dedicated to the catastrophe victims, located in the Powązki Military Cemetery in Warsaw.

Polish Foreign Ministry particularly remembers their employees who died on duty. These were: Andrzej Kremer, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs responsible for legal, treaty, and consular issues; Mariusz Handzlik, Undersecretary of State in the Chancellery of the President of the Republic of Poland, who worked at the MFA from 1994 to 2005, also as Deputy Director of the Security Policy Department; Stanisław Jerzy Komorowski, Deputy Minister of Defence, Acting Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2005 to 2006, and Mariusz Kazana – Diplomatic Protocol Director. Diplomatic Protocol management laid wreaths on the gravestones of the foreign service corps members.

The commemoration took place also in Russia, where Polish Ambassador Krzysztof Krajewski, together with a delegation of foreign service members and representatives of the Polish diaspora, paid tribute to the victims on the crash site of the Polish presidential aircraft. This year’s event in Smolensk was held at the newly installed cross, which replaced the previous symbol of remembrance on the site.
 
Photo: Marcin Maniewski/MFA