Pagan threat to Poland

Date: 04/06/1998

While we are on the subject of enlargement, it seems some of the applicant countries still have a thing or two to learn about news management.

The Polish government decided recently that the opening of its gigantic hyper-modern new embassy should be celebrated with an artistic theme, so it commissioned an equally impressive painting for the occasion.

Days before the opening, however, a small problem was discovered - the masterpiece was entitled “The Rape of Poland by Pagan Europa”. Mysteriously, only hours before its unveiling, the 'Pagan Europa' epithet disappeared. But the Poles appear to have failed to inform Foreign Affairs Commissioner Hans van den Broek, who spelled out the title of the creation in full in his opening speech.