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Nov 13, 2024

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Polish PM Threatens Polish President

Police nab two L&J lawmakers after PM Tusk threatens Polish president

By Robert Strybel
Warsaw Correspondent


In Poland’s latest legal wrangle, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk (in photo) went on national TV to accuse President Andrzej Duda of “obstructing justice” by “hiding” convicted criminals and could face up to five years in prison. Law & Justice (L&J) lawmakers, former chief of the Anti-Corruption Bureau Mariusz Kamiński and his deputy Maciej Wąsik, had been on trial over alleged “abuse of power” for their overzealous crackdown on corruption, but in 2015 Poland’s newly elected President pardoned them. When Tusk again came to power in 2023, the pardon was declared illegal and the two lawmakers were sentenced to two years in prison. Police did not find them at home when they came to arrest them, since they were Duda’s guests at the presidential palace. When Duda had to leave the palace to meet a group of Belarusian dissidents, police marched in, arrested the two and took them to prison. Duda said he was shocked by their arrest. Conservatives are calling them “Poland’s first political prisoners since the collapse of communist rule,” while the Tusk camp is triumphant that justice has been done.” This marks yet another stage of the Polish-Polish war hat has poisoned the nation’s political scene since the early 21st century.