CONTACTS with China from the area now known as Poland date back to the 16th century when a Jesuit priest explored the southern provinces and ventured as far as Hainan island.
He was one of the first Europeans to visit the area and the first to chart it on a map.
Only three copies of his work survived. One is in Poland, another is in the Library of American Congress, but the third has since been found to be missing.
A sizeable Polish community also settled in Harbin before World War II.
The people had been exiled to Siberia and the Far East following a failed uprising against their Tsarist overlords from Russia who shared the territory with Austria and Prussia before Poland came into existence.
Descendants of these exiles living in Harbin later built the Trans-Siberian Railway.
