A team from the ministry reviewed the work of the subcommittee, which was formed in 2016 by then-defense minister Antoni Macierewicz to investigate the disaster.

Dozens of senior Polish officials and military leaders were killed when the Polish presidential plane crashed while attempting to land at Smolensk Airport in western Russia.

An official investigation concluded that a number of factors, such as bad weather and pilot error, had contributed to the crash. But Jarosław Kaczyński, the brother of the late president and head of the right-wing Law and Justice party, has long maintained that the plane was brought down as the result of a Russian plot.

Kaczyński’s supporters have claimed that Donald Tusk, the current prime minister who was also premier in 2010, worked in league with Russia to kill the Polish president.

When Law and Justice formed a government in 2015, it established the subcommittee, led by Macierewicz, who is also a friend of Kaczyński, to reinvestigate the disaster. Macierewicz’s close association with Kaczyński and the fact that he also propagated a bomb plot theory prompted allegations that the subcommittee was biased.

The subcommission concluded that explosions had downed the aircraft.

Presenting the new report's findings, Poland’s defense minister, Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, said the subcommittee's "true purpose... was to confirm a single hypothesis of an explosion and dismiss any contradictory arguments or analyses."

Plan to ‘destroy national unity’

According to Kosiniak-Kamysz, the report proves that the strategic goal of the subcommission was to “create further division in society and destroy national unity, spread lies and untruths.”

He also said there were numerous instances of wastefulness by the subcommission, including non-compliance with the law on public tenders, payment of large salaries without supervision and contracting experts who did not have appropriate knowledge or skills.

The defense minister said that the Smolensk subcommission cost the state treasury 81 million złoty (€ 18.6 million) in total.

During the presentation, Poland’s deputy defense minister, Cezary Tomczyk, announced that the defense ministry has submitted 41 cases to prosecutors.

Of those, 24 concern Macierewicz. The accusations against him include exceeding his authority for personal gain, neglecting his duties, forgery, bribery and allowing unauthorized individuals to participate in the committee's work.

Alongside Macierewicz, former defense minister Mariusz Błaszczak also faces scrutiny, with 10 of the cases relating to his time in office. Others implicated include Bartłomiej Misiewicz, a close ally of Macierewicz, as well as Wacław Berczyński, Kazimierz Nowaczyk, Glenn Jorgensen and other subcommittee members.

In December last year, the new Polish government dissolved Macierewicz's subcommittee and dismissed its members.

In January, Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz appointed a team of experts to scrutinize the subcommittee's operations.

Macierewicz hits back

Macierewicz, meanwhile, hit back by saying that “the essence [of the report] is the protection of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin...and the protection of Donald Tusk’s policies.”

Macierewicz also alleged that defense minister Kosiniak-Kamysz and others involved in examining the work of the Smolensk subcommission committed a crime by launching the investigation without referring the matter to a court.