Page 45 - bne monthly magazine June 2024 Russian Despair Index

bne June 2024 Central Europe I 45
The fundamental problem with the system established by PiS is legal and hardly appealing to the wider public – unless one happens to be involved in a court case.
That is because legally dubious judge nominations by the KRS provide premises to undermine any court decision that involved those nominations; this applies all the way up to the Supreme Court.
In one case, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled in 2021 that a Polish company could not
get a fair trial because the Polish government illegally appointed a judge to the Constitutional Tribunal that had reviewed the company’s case.
Brussels began easing financial restrictions against Poland when the Tusk government presented its reform roadmap in February. In response,
the Commission announced green- lighting the release of €137bn from the bloc’s pandemic recovery fund and the cohesion funding pool.
The European Union disbursed €6.3bn from the pandemic recovery fund to Poland in April.
The impact of the payout – and others to follow this year – will be noticeable in the economy by the end of this year, although significant growth
is expected only in 2025, as time is
needed for the investments to ramp up.
The money is projected to boost Poland’s economic growth to 4%-5% next year.
“Great news from Brussels today! Thank you President von der Leyen
for cooperation and support! Poland is consequently bringing back rule of law. We are determined and devoted to our common European values,” Poland’s Justice Minister Adam Bodnar said in apostonX.
The Commission will now present an analysis of the state of the rule of law in Poland at a General Affairs Council meeting on May 21.
Polish judge shows up in Minsk asking for political asylum
Wojciech Kosc in Warsaw
Asenior Polish judge asked for political asylum in Belarus on May 6, citing objections to Poland's policies toward Belarus and Russia.
In his resignation letter released on X, Judge Tomasz Szmydt announced his immediate departure from the Warsaw Administrative Court, saying he was protesting against the actions of the Polish authorities that could potentially lead to military conflict with Belarus and Russia. Szmydt urged Polish authorities to normalise relations with Minsk and Moscow.
Tensions between Poland and Belarus have run high for years now. Warsaw accuses Minsk of orchestrating a border crisis and supporting Russia's actions in Ukraine. Poland is also home to several Belarusian dissidents after Lukashenka suppressed dissent following his contested re-election in 2020.
Appearing at a press conference in Minsk, Szmydt commended President
Alyaksandr Lukashenka's leadership, criticising Warsaw for being influenced by the US and the UK.
His move to Minsk drew condemnation in Warsaw. Stanisław Żaryn, an aide to President Andrzej Duda, branded him a "scoundrel and traitor" for defaming Poland and Nato.
Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski called the development “shocking”.
“If someone chooses Belarus, it means that they have been working in Poland for years to advance someone’s interests - whose interests?” Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said.
Poland’s National Public Prosecutor's Office said that it launched a probe into Szmydt’s defection, which, it said, might have been a crime of working for foreign intelligence.
Poland’s counterintelligence agency ABW said on May 6 that it was going
to look at “the scope of classified information, which [Szmydt], who requested asylum in Belarus, had access to”.
Szmydt is seen as a judge openly loyal to Poland’s previous government of Law and Justice (PiS). He even spent
a brief time working in the Ministry of Justice under the PiS government.
Polish media reported in 2019 that he was part of a group discussing ways to discredit judges not aligned with the PiS party government. The judge exposed the workings of the group
in an interview in 2022.
Szmydt's defection echoes a similar incident in December 2021 when Emil Czeczko, a Polish soldier, fled to Belarus and criticised Poland's handling of the migration crisis on Belarusian state media. Czeczko allegedly died by suicide in Minsk in March the following year.
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