A Polish priest who had close contact with the late pope John Paul II, was an informer for Poland's communist-era intelligence service, an official from an investigative institute said Wednesday.
The Polish Institute for National Remembrance "has files stating that Father Konrad Stanislaw Hejmo worked secretly in the 1980s with the security service in communist Poland," IPN head Leon Kieres told reporters.
The IPN investigates alleged crimes committed by Nazi Germany and the communist regime in Poland.
Kieres said Hejmo, 69, who for 21 years was in charge of bringing groups of Polish pilgrims to the Vatican and was in close contact with the pope's entourage, had used the pseudonyms "Hejnal" and "Dominik" during his work for the security service, Kieres said.
Hejmo dismissed the accusations as "absurd" when contacted by telephone by Polish public television station TVP.
He admitted that his services had been "solicited" by state security, but added that so were the services of "all priests in Poland."
"Every Polish priest had his 'mentor'" in Polish intelligence, he said.
He speculated that information he gave to the primate of Poland could have been "recorded unbeknownst to me" and "edited" by the security service.
The file held by the National Remembrance Institute on Hejmo's work with the communist-era intelligence service is 700 pages long and covers the 1980s "and earlier periods," officials said.
Asked about the large file, Hejmo said it could be made up of the many articles he wrote when he was deputy chief of the Polish episcopate's press office in Rome.
He was appointed to that post in 1979, a year after Krakow archbishop Karol Wojtyla became Pope John Paul II, the first pontiff from still communist eastern and central Europe. John Paul II is widely credited with bringing down the oppressive communist regime.
"When I wrote an article, I signed it. The articles were then sent to the primate of Poland with a review of the Italian press on the pope," Hejmo said.
Monsignor Tadeusz Pieronek, a member of the Polish episcopate, said the revelations about Hejmo came as a "big surprise."
"One must not forget that the communist system was pitiless... it had everyone in its clutches," he said.
"Now is not the time to reveal this type of information after all we went through with the death of the pope," he added.
John Paul II died on April 2, plunging his predominantly Catholic homeland into a week of official mourning.
Kieres announced last week that recordings containing the "recognisable voice of a cleric" talking about Wojtyla indicated there were communist-era informers in his entourage.
The IPN chief also said then that he was surprised at the huge file kept on Wojtyla.
"I have never seen in the IPN archives as voluminous a file kept on one person," said Kieres, who has headed the institute for five years.
A member of Hejmo's staff said the Polish cleric was on his way to Warsaw Wednesday evening.