Ex-Warsaw archbishop hid past from Vatican-agency

WARSAW, Jan 12 (Reuters) - Former Warsaw archbishop Stanislaw Wielgus, who resigned in disgrace this week, concealed the fact that he spied for communist police from Pope Benedict, the Vatican's envoy to Poland was quoted as saying.

''What the bishop said (before his appointment) did not indicate there had been collaboration,'' the Vatican's representative in Poland, Archbishop Jozef Kowalczyk, said yesterday in an interview with KAI Catholic news service that was published by Polish news agency PAP.

The powerful Polish Church and the Vatican were deeply embarrassed by revelations that Wielgus collaborated with communists. He was forced to step down on Sunday only days after his official appointment by Pope Benedict.

On Friday, Poland's bishops met to formulate a policy for dealing with other priests who archives show collaborated before a 1989 revolution toppled communism.

REUTERS SY VC0932