The article takes the renewed demands of the Polish government as an opportunity to examine the question of whether Germany is obliged to pay reparations to Poland. Based on an analysis of the international agreements concluded since 1945, it can be shown that the Polish government’s demands on Germany are unfounded.

The issue of war reparations was a subject of controversy in Polish-German relations for a long time. This was due to the position of the Federal Republic of Germany that this issue had been deferred to the moment of German unification. The German concept of reparations also included the individual claims of Polish victims of National Socialism (Nazism). The case for interstate reparations from Germany to Poland was closed as a result of the Polish waiver of 1953, while the issue of individual compensation for Polish victims was symbolically resolved as a result of agreements between Poland and the Federal Republic of Germany only in 1990 and 2000. The scope and amount of any new payments depends on the agreements of particular countries or organizations with the Federal Republic of Germany. As long as the victims are still alive, new pragmatic solutions should not be ruled out.