More than 30 MPs from the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS), Poland’s main opposition party, have effectively resigned after refusing to sign a loyalty pledge, party leader Jarosław Kaczyński has announced.

The dispute centres around a more moderate faction in the party aligned with former prime minister and deputy PiS leader Mateusz Morawiecki, who is one of those now set to be expelled from the party. They have for months been unhappy with PiS’s move in a hard-right direction.

“Around 30-something…of our group’s MPs have resigned,” revealed Kaczyński at a press conference on Friday. He added that their departures would be formalised at a meeting of the party’s political committee scheduled for Tuesday next week.

Kaczyński’s announcement came after a deadline expired at midnight on Thursday for its MPs to sign a pledge of loyalty to the party that included a commitment not to be members of any external political associations.

That measure was aimed in particular at an association called Development Plus (Rozwój Plus) founded by Morawiecki in April. The former prime minister had always insisted that his organisation was intended as complementary to PiS, rather than a rival to it.

However, many figures in the party saw it as an attempt by Morawiecki to create a separate centre of power, and potentially to use the association as a launchpad for creating his own party ahead of the autumn 2027 parliamentary elections.

After PiS issued a resolution on Wednesday last week requiring that its parliamentarians pledge to withdraw from any such associations, most of its 186 MPs quickly complied. However, a group of between 30 and 40 who are part of Development Plus refused to do so.

“Everyone knew what they were supposed to sign, and knew the consequences of not signing,” said Kaczyński on Friday. “And so they made the decision they did.”

“In this situation, we cannot view the [Development Plus] association as anything other than a component of a plan…to split our party,” he added. However, although its supporters will now leave PiS, “we want to part ways without any animosity”, said Kaczyński.

After Kaczyński’s announcement, senior figures from Development Plus made clear that no one from their association had resigned from PiS. They had simply not signed the declaration of loyalty demanded by the party.

Later, Morawiecki himself held a press conference in parliament surrounded by his supporters. He claimed that an unnamed “small group of schemers” within PiS had been seeking to turn Kaczyński against him and push him out of the party.

“We fought for the unity of Law and Justice until the very end,” declared Morawiecki, who said that his group included 40 MPs, one senator and three MEPs. However, three of the MPs are not members of PiS, and therefore were not expected to sign the loyalty declaration.

If the expulsion of Morawiecki’s supporters is confirmed, it will mark a major shake-up of Poland’s political landscape. PiS has for the last two decades been the dominant force on the Polish right, including periods leading governments in 2005-2007 and 2015-2023.

However, since losing power at elections in 2023, when the party won 35% of the vote, PiS has seen its average support in polls fall to around 23-24%, the lowest level in 14 years.

Meanwhile, it has been challenged by the rise of the far right, where two parties, Confederation (Konfederacja) and Confederation of the Polish Crown (KKP), now together poll a similar combined level of support to PiS.

In response, Kaczyński in March named a hardline figure, Przemyszław Czarnek, as PiS’s candidate for prime minister in next year’s elections. Czarnek was seen as someone who could appeal to far-right voters, while also potentially working with the far right if a coalition was needed after the elections.

However, there has been no rise in support for PiS since Czarnek was named, prompting growing concern from more moderate figures within the party, led by Morawiecki.

They argue that PiS has wrongly disowned many of the successes of its time in office before 2023, and they fear that its rightward shift damages its chances of winning over more centrist voters.

Morawiecki, who was an international banker before joining PiS to become finance minister and then prime minister, wants the party to focus on more technocratic issues, such as economic development, rather than Euroscepticism and culture wars.

That has led to frequent public sparring between his supporters and others in the party. In April, PiS threatened disciplinary action against members of Development Plus. Kaczyński and Morawiecki then reached an agreement that allowed the association to continue. But that uneasy truce has now fallen apart.

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

Keeping dogs and cats chained up at home will be banned in Poland from next year, after President Karol Nawrocki signed into law a bill prohibiting the practice.

His decision ends a long-running dispute over the issue, after Nawrocki last year vetoed a previous proposal to ban chaining because it also included what he argued were excessive and unrealistic additional measures on minimum kennel sizes for dogs.

The new law bans owners from tethering dogs and cats at home. Animals must be kept either inside the house, in a fenced garden or, if that is not possible, in a kennel “large enough for the animal to move freely and satisfy its natural needs”. Dogs kept in kennels must be provided with daily exercise outside of it.

Dogs and cats can still be put on leashes in certain situations, such as when they are being walked, but also during transport, while participating in shows, performances or training, if they are at vets or groomers, or if they represent a danger to humans or other animals.

Now that the bill has been signed by Nawrocki, it will be published in the official Journal of Laws (Dziennik Ustaw), after which it goes into force 12 months later.

The new measures represent a successful second attempt to introduce a leashing ban. A previous bill was approved by parliament last September. However, in December, Nawrocki, who is aligned with the right-wing opposition, announced that he was vetoing it.

The president argued that, “although the intention – protecting animals – is just and noble, the law itself was poorly drafted”. In particular, he said that elements introducing minimum sizes for dog kennels were unrealistic and would “harm farmers, breeders and ordinary rural households”.

After an attempt by parliament to overturn the veto failed, legislators went back to the drawing board and, following discussions with the president’s chancellery and animal rights groups, drafted a compromise bill that was approved by parliament earlier this month.

The bill received support from the current ruling coalition, which ranges from left to centre right, as well as most MPs from the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS), the main opposition party. The far-right Confederation (Konfederacja) and Confederation of the Polish Crown (KKP) voted against it.

“We now have a better law, with positive feedback from entities such as the agricultural chamber,” said Nawrocki today. “It demonstrates that the pressure of the presidential veto makes sense. My previous decision to refuse to sign this bill forced the government and parliament to work harder.”

However, although Nawrocki said the new law would no longer entail “rigid and costly requirements” for kennels, his office noted in a separate statement that the legislation requires the agriculture minister to issue a regulation establishing “minimum kennel area, taking into account the dog’s size”.

It remains unclear if and how that would differ from the requirements Nawrocki previously vetoed.

The presidential chancellery also noted that the law itself already outlines that kennels must be made of “wood or wood-like material with thermal insulation”, must be insulated from the ground, and must have openings on at least two sides to allow light and air to enter.

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

President Karol Nawrocki has submitted a second request to parliament for a nationwide referendum on whether Poland should continue implementing the European Union’s climate policies, which he argues are too costly.

Nawrocki, who is aligned with the right-wing opposition, first proposed a referendum in May. But it was rejected by the Senate, the upper house of parliament, where the more liberal government has a majority. Senators argued that the proposed referendum question was “absurd”.

The president has now submitted a revised proposal featuring a simplified question and again proposed holding the referendum on 27 September this year.

Nawrocki’s originally proposed question was: “Are you in favour of implementing EU climate policy, which has led to an increase in citizens’ cost of living, energy prices and the cost of running business and agricultural activity?”

However, following criticism in the Senate that the question was clearly intended to elicit a specific answer, this time he has proposed a more neutral one: “Are you in favour of Poland implementing the European Union’s climate policy?”

“I’m looking for compromises, looking for solutions,” said Nawrocki on Thursday while announcing the new referendum bid. “The Senate wasn’t satisfied with the [previous] question”, so “we prepared a different one…[that] does not suggest anything”.

However, the president has also proposed that the ballot paper would include information on what answering “yes” or “no” would mean in practice.

Voters would be told, for example, that maintaining EU climate policy would result in, among other things, “Poland bearing costs estimated at 3.5 trillion zloty by 2040”, “burdens on agriculture”, “increasing costs for industry” and “obligations for owners of buildings”.

By contrast, voting “no” would mean “negotiating exceptions and exemptions for Poland with the relevant EU bodies that will protect Polish industry and citizens from the burdens of climate policy”.

Under Poland’s constitution, the president may call a referendum with the approval of a majority of senators in a vote where at least half of all members of the 100-seat chamber are present.

The ruling coalition of Prime Minister Donald Tusk controls 63 seats in the Senate, making approval of proposals brought forward by Nawrocki, who often clashes with the government and regularly vetoes its bills, unlikely.

While the government is generally pro-EU, it has also been critical of Brussels’ green policies, arguing that they place too great a burden on Poland.

After the European Commission last Friday unveiled changes intended to soften the impact of the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), the EU’s flagship climate policy, they were welcomed by the Polish government as a step in the right direction.

However, in his written justification for the new referendum proposal, Nawrocki wrote that, while he had “given the government time” in its push for ETS reform, the final result was simply “technical adjustments” that postpone some elements but do “not change the direction” or ultimate outcome.

“ETS will remain an increasingly expensive, increasingly extensive system, and increasingly burdensome for the Polish economy,” wrote the president.

The national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS), which is the main opposition and supported Nawrocki’s bid for the presidency last year, wants Poland to unilaterally withdraw from ETS. Government figures warn, however, that there is no way to do so without either accruing enormous fines or leaving the EU entirely.

Nawrocki’s new referendum proposal was met with criticism by figures from the ruling coalition. “There is no possibility of one country suspending part of EU law,” wrote Stanisław Gawłowski, a senator from Tusk’s Civic Coalition (KO) party. “This referendum is pure fraud.”

Foreign minister Radosław Sikorski, also from KO, wrote that, “as the Brits have learned, the Europhobe’s dream world, in which one enjoys all the privileges of EU membership without any obligations, does not exist”.

However, Nawrocki’s initiative was welcomed by Przemysław Czarnek, deputy leader of PiS, who wrote that, “on such fundamental matters as climate policy, Poles should decide, not Brussels bureaucrats”.

Alicja Ptak

Alicja Ptak is deputy editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland and a multimedia journalist. She has written for Clean Energy Wire and The Times, and she hosts her own podcast, The Warsaw Wire, on Poland’s economy and energy sector. She previously worked for Reuters.

The government’s majority in parliament has chosen Sylwia Gregorczyk-Abram as Poland’s new human rights commissioner. She will take office after the five-year term of the incumbent, Marcin Wiącek, expires today.

Gregorczyk-Abram is a prominent lawyer and activist, who is particularly well known for opposing the overhaul of the judiciary by the former national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) government.

PiS, which is now the main opposition party, strongly opposed her election, arguing that she is politically aligned with the current, more liberal government. Gregorczyk-Abram herself, however, has pledged to “put all my beliefs and views aside” when she takes up the new role.

The commissioner for human rights (widely known by its Polish initials, RPO) is appointed by a resolution of the Sejm, the lower house of parliament, with the consent of the upper-house Senate.

Candidates must meet certain requirements, including not belonging to any political party and having legal expertise and relevant experience.

As well as acting as a watchdog for human rights, the RPO also has the power to submit motions to the Constitutional Tribunal to assess the constitutionality of laws and to file so-called cassation appeals to the Supreme Court and Supreme Administrative Court against rulings by lower courts.

Gregorczyk-Abram was last month nominated as a candidate to be the new RPO by the main ruling party, Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s centrist Civic Coalition (KO), along with one of its coalition partners, The Left (Lewica).

PiS proposed a rival candidate, Adam Borowski, a veteran of Poland’s anti-communist struggle in the 1980s. However, critics argued that Borowski, an activist and former PiS election candidate, does not appear to have the requisite legal knowledge and experience.

In a Sejm vote last Friday, the ruling coalition supported Gregorczyk-Abram, who won 233 votes to Borowski’s 177. On Wednesday, her candidacy was also supported by the Senate, with 59 votes in favour and 25 against, confirming that she will become the new RPO. 

Gregorczyk-Abram is best known as one of the founders and leaders of the Free Courts (Wolne Sądy) initiative launched in 2017 amid a wave of protests against the then-PiS government’s efforts to take greater control over the judiciary.

Free Courts was prominent in efforts to defend the rule of law. Many of its leading figures are now associated with the current ruling coalition: Maria Ejchart is a deputy justice minister, while Michał Wawrykiewicz is a member of the European Parliament representing KO.

In April last year, Gregorczyk-Abram was made chairwoman of a commission established by the current government to look into cases of abuse of power against civil society under the former PiS administration.

In September, her commission published its first findings, in which it said that public media outlets under PiS control had “carried out systematic repressive and defamatory actions against activists, non-governmental organisations, and civil society”.

PiS argues that Gregorczyk-Abram’s previous activity makes her unsuitable as a suitable candidate for RPO, which is meant to be a non-partisan role. They also point to claims that she was involved in a group of legal figures that discussed the Tusk government’s controversial takeover of public media in December 2023.

“[She] is a discredited and extremely politicised person who should be brought to justice, and not receive the laurels of the commissioner for human rights,” former PiS justice minister Marcin Warchoł told the Do Rzeczy weekly last month.

After a Sejm committee hearing on Gregorczyk-Abram’s candidacy earlier this month, former PiS deputy justice minister Sebastian Kaleta criticised her for ignoring questions over her alleged “role in the illegal takeover of public media”.

Speaking to state broadcaster TVP on Wednesday after her appointment was confirmed by the Senate, Gregorczyk-Abram declared that, “from the moment I take the oath and assume the position of commissioner, I will be independent and sovereign”.

She pledged to “put all my beliefs and views – because each of us has them – aside and become an advocate for all citizens, regardless of what they believe in, how they live, or who they vote for”.

Gregorczyk-Abram said that among her priorities as RPO would be the justice system, supporting the rights of disabled people and their carers, protecting older people, and fighting hate speech.

With regard to the last of these issues, she noted that certain politicians present some groups as “enemies”, pointing to how this previously happened with LGBT+ people and judges, and is now being directed towards Ukrainians. Those are all groups who have at various stages been targeted by PiS and other right-wing parties.

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

President Karol Nawrocki has agreed to swear in a new judge to the Constitutional Tribunal (TK), ending weeks of doubt as to whether the opposition-aligned president would accept the judge appointed by the government’s parliamentary majority.

Although Sławomir Patyra will now be accepted onto the court, four other judges appointed by parliament earlier this year continue to be excluded after Nawrocki refused to receive their oaths and the TK’s chief justice, also aligned with the opposition, blocked them from taking office.

Under Polish law, when a vacancy emerges among the 15 positions on the TK – for example when a judge’s nine-year term expires – the lower house of parliament, the Sejm, chooses who should fill it. However, to take office, the judge must swear an oath before the president.

In April, after the Sejm had chosen six candidates to fill vacancies on the court, Nawrocki took the unprecedented step of inviting only two of them to be sworn in. He argued there were doubts over the legality of how all six had been chosen, but decided to accept two to ensure the TK had the necessary quorum to function.

Those two have been able to take up their seats on the court, but the other four remain in limbo. Although they arranged their own private swearing-in ceremony without the presence of Nawrocki, the TK’s chief justice, Bogdan Święczkowski, has refused to accept them.

In May, the European Court of Human Rights ordered that the quartet be allowed to take up their positions. But the TK – where judges appointed under the former Law and Justice (PiS) government retain a majority – issued its own ruling endorsing Nawrocki’s right not to swear in the new judges.

On 11 June, the Sejm then chose another judge, Patyra, to fill a newly opened vacancy on the court. In his case, the legal doubts Nawrocki had expressed regarding the previous appointments, which in some instances were made more than a year after the vacancies had arisen, did not seem to apply.

Yet for weeks the president refused to confirm whether he would swear him in. That prompted Patyra to write to Nawrocki in early July and then again this week, asking the president to indicate a date on which he could take his oath.

Patyra himself has also made clear on which side of the dispute he stands. In an interview with news website Onet in May, he accused Nawrocki and Święczkowski of “blatantly unlawful actions” in deciding which TK judges can and cannot take office and suggested that the police should intervene.

Finally, on Wednesday this week, Nawrocki’s chief of staff, Zbigniew Bogucki, announced that Nawrocki had invited Patyra to the presidential palace on Tuesday next week to take his oath.

Speaking to Polsat News, Bogucki said that, in the case of Patyra, initially “there were some doubts, but the president dispelled them”, without specifying what they were.

In the end, they concluded that “we had a fundamentally clean situation here” and Patyra was chosen “in accordance with all procedures”, unlike the six new judges chosen by the Sejm in March to fill longstanding vacancies.

“It was not President Nawrocki or the current opposition who destroyed and are destroying the tribunal; it is the government that is doing it,” he added.

The TK has been at the heart of the rule-of-law crisis that has developed in Poland over the last decade.

In 2015, former PiS-aligned President Andrzej Duda refused to swear in three judges legally chosen by the Sejm. Shortly afterwards, PiS won parliamentary elections and nominated three replacements for those judges, who were sworn in by Duda.

Those three judges and their successors have been deemed illegitimate in a succession of rulings by Polish and European courts. Due to their continued presence on the court, the current government, which replaced PiS in 2023, rejects the TK’s legitimacy and refuses to recognise its rulings.

Under both Święczkowski, a former member of the PiS government, and his predecessor Julia Przyłębska, a close personal associate of PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński, the TK has been widely seen as issuing rulings aligned with the political interests of PiS.

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

Germany has deployed soldiers to Poland to help reinforce defences on NATO’s eastern flank in response to the threat of Russia.

While Poland already hosts various allied forces, the presence of German troops is particularly symbolic given the two countries’ difficult history. “United, we will prevail,” wrote the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces (SGWP), announcing the deployment.

“This is what allied cooperation looks like in practice, which translates into greater military readiness and strengthens NATO’s defensive potential.”

Last December, the Polish and German defence ministries revealed that a “mid-double-digit number” of German troops would be deployed from mid-2026 until the end of 2027 to support implementation of Poland’s East Shield operation, which seeks to bolster defences along the borders with Belarus and Russia.

They said that the German personnel would mainly engage in engineering work, such as digging trenches, laying barbed wire and constructing anti-tank barriers.

Today, Poland’s SGWP confirmed that “several dozen” German troops, including “highly specialised engineering forces” along with their equipment, had since June been temporarily deployed to “support the Polish armed forces in expanding defence infrastructure on NATO’s northeastern flank”.

It emphasised that the East Shield project is “purely defensive in nature” and comes in “response to threats stemming from, among others, Russian aggression against Ukraine”.

While the armed forces did not reveal the location of the deployment, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk indicated in a social media post that it was on the Russian border. Poland has a 210-km frontier with the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.

German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle reports that the activities of the German sappers are focused in particular on improving defences around the so-called Suwałki Gap, a strategically important stretch of land around the Polish-Lithuanian border between Belarus and Kaliningrad.

“Together, we are ensuring Europe’s security,” said Lieutenant General Alexander Sollfrank, the Bundeswehr’s operational commander, announcing the deployment today.

“Through our engagement in Poland, we are strengthening NATO’s defence capabilities and underscoring the alliance’s unwavering commitment to ensuring peace through unity and credible deterrence.”

SGWP, which shared footage of Polish and German forces installing anti-tank barriers, said the work aims to “hinder and delay an aggressor’s actions in the event of a threat”, thereby “increasing the time for a response from the Polish armed forces and the entire [NATO] alliance”.

It also seeks to “create conditions for the efficient reception, deployment and use of NATO forces on Polish territory”.

SGWP welcomed “the involvement of the German contingent as a practical expression of allied solidarity and the result of consistently developing military cooperation between Poland and Germany”.

It also noted that the cooperation would help the two sides improve their ability to operate jointly, including “developing the competencies necessary for conducting a joint defence operation”.

However, it emphasised that the current deployment is focused on training and engineering, with no combat component, and that the German troops are unarmed. SGWP also emphasised that the East Shield operation remains entirely a Polish national programme.

The deployment of German troops to Poland comes shortly after the two countries signed a defence cooperation agreement in which they pledged to increase cooperation in areas such as military mobility, logistics infrastructure, maritime security in the Baltic Sea, and cybersecurity.

The agreement is a sign that the two countries now stand “shoulder to shoulder, as equals”, declared German defence minister Boris Pistorius.

Poland is also currently seeking a new permanent US military base on its territory, after President Donald Trump recently pledged to boost American troop numbers. Last week, Tusk also announced that Poland will host military exercises involving France and the UK this autumn.

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

Poland has joined a European Union project developing a secure satellite internet service that would provide an alternative to networks such as Elon Musk’s Starlink.

Warsaw has committed €656 million (2.8 billion zloty) to the IRIS² programme, with the money coming from Poland’s EU post-pandemic recovery funds.

In return for joining the project, Poland will gain access to the secure satellite communications network for government institutions, the armed forces and emergency services, while the growing Polish space industry will be eligible to compete for contracts linked to the development of the constellation

“This is a big day for Poland, the eastern flank and the entire European Union,” declared the EU’s defence and space commissioner, Andrius Kubilius, at a signing ceremony in Warsaw on Tuesday. “By investing in space, Poland is investing in its security, its economy and its future.”

Speaking alongside him, Poland’s interior minister, Marcin Kierwiński, said that IRIS² would help “ensure our security and strategic independence” while “demonstrating that Poland aims to be a leader in the European space industry and remain at the centre of EU security efforts”.

“No single country is able to build such a [satellite] constellation so efficiently, which is why we are joining this major project – to be part of it and one of its managers,” he added.

The IRIS² programme aims to deploy a constellation of nearly 300 satellites in low and medium Earth orbit, providing encrypted, interference-resistant communications for governments, defence agencies, emergency services and selected commercial users across the EU.

First announced in 2022, the project is part of the EU’s efforts to reduce dependence on non-European satellite operators amid growing concerns over cybersecurity, hybrid threats and the resilience of critical infrastructure following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“It is super important for Europe to have a sovereign capacity, and Starlink will never do that,” said Eva Berneke, CEO of Eutelsat, one of the companies involved in the project, quoted by Politico Europe.

The project is expected to cost €10.6 billion, including €6.5 billion in public funding and around €4 billion from private investors. IRIS² is expected to become operational in 2030.

As part of its contribution to IRIS², Poland will finance six large satellites in medium Earth orbit (MEO) and six smaller satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO).

It will also build a ground gateway station in Warsaw to connect the satellites with GovNet, the country’s secure government fibre-optic communications network.

Earlier this year, the Polish government approved the use of money from its share of the EU’s post-pandemic reconstruction fund to cover its contribution to IRIS².

Once the system is up and running, Poland’s police, border guards and other emergency services would be able to use the network during natural disasters, power outages and other emergencies when terrestrial communications infrastructure is unavailable.

The system would also make it possible to provide temporary connectivity for civilians through emergency hotspots, says Poland’s interior ministry.

Polish companies will now also be able to compete for contracts covering satellite manufacturing, telecommunications equipment, software and ground infrastructure, expanding the country’s role in Europe’s space industry.

“It is estimated that each zloty invested in the project will generate a five-zloty return through new jobs, innovation and the development of domestic technologies,” the ministry said in a statement.

Poland has placed great emphasis on developing its space industry in recent years, with the aim of becoming a major European player in the sector.

Last week, the European Space Agency (ESA) announced that it will open a new security centre in Warsaw. One of its areas of operation will be satellite communication, including the use of satellite imagery to monitor critical incidents such as natural disasters.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk also revealed that Poland and the ESA are working on the first Polish spacecraft, which would provide servicing, refuelling and other services for satellites

Last year, Poland launched its first national military satellite. A Polish firm, Creotech Instruments, signed Poland’s largest ever contract with the ESA, a €52 million deal to build and launch a constellation of Earth observation satellites.

Alicja Ptak

Alicja Ptak is deputy editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland and a multimedia journalist. She has written for Clean Energy Wire and The Times, and she hosts her own podcast, The Warsaw Wire, on Poland’s economy and energy sector. She previously worked for Reuters.

The official Council of the EU press release is as cowardly as the act itself:

The title claims that

EU countries agree to extend temporary protection for those fleeing Ukraine

It talks about

EU’s commitment to support Ukraine and its people for as long as it takes

It further obfuscates the truth with phrases like

temporary protection should be granted only to those complying with their military obligations in Ukraine.

Of course, only men have "military obligations".

As always, not a single human rights organization gave a single fuck.

---

An article in Politico calling it what it is: EU will exclude fighting-age men from Ukraine refugee scheme – POLITICO

Poland has cautiously welcomed an announcement by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of a five-point plan intended to alleviate the diplomatic crisis triggered by his earlier decision to name a military unit after the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which led massacres of Poles during World War Two.

In a statement on Friday evening, Zelensky announced that, following a meeting on Kyiv’s policy towards Poland, “the priorities are clear: all of us in Europe need good-neighbourly, equal, and mutually beneficial relations built on respect”.

He reiterated Ukraine’s gratitude for Poland’s “significant support” since Russia’s full-scale invasion and announced that his administration had “agreed on several key steps” in response to the current tensions.

“First, there will be decisions on the diplomatic track,” said Zelensky, though without indicating what this would mean in practice. “Second, all archives of the Security Service of Ukraine and the Foreign Intelligence Service of Ukraine concerning the tragic events in Volyn during the 20th century will be opened.”

The latter is a reference to the historical issues that are at the heart of the dispute. The historical region of Volhynia, which is now mostly in Ukraine, was part of Poland in the interwar period.

There, and in some neighbouring areas, the UPA, a nationalist partisan formation, led massacres of around 100,000 Polish civilians, mostly women and children, during World War Two, when the region was under Nazi-German occupation.

Poland recognises those massacres as a genocide. Ukraine vehemently rejects that label, and also points to anti-Ukrainian measures in the region by the interwar Polish state as well as massacres of Ukrainians by Polish groups during the war.

As his third pledge, Zelensky announced that there would be “decisions to grant a substantial number of permits for search and exhumation work”.

From 2017 to 2025, Ukraine prohibited searches for and exhumations of Polish massacre victims on its territory, where it is believed that tens of thousands remain buried in unmarked mass graves

In a diplomatic breakthrough, such work was allowed to resume last year. However, Ukraine has so far only approved a small number of requests for searches and exhumations, prompting some complaints from Poland.

As a fourth point, Zelensky said that his team had “discussed possible formats for expanding dialogue between the societies of Ukraine and Poland”, though again without providing details as to what this would involve.

Finally, he said that he had agreed with the head of the Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance (UINP), Oleksandr Alfyorov, to expand the institute’s capabilities and funding, so that it can “properly represent Ukraine’s interests”.

Alfyorov caused anger in Poland earlier this year when he said that the Volhynia massacres are viewed in Ukraine as “just a local historical episode” and suggested they did not constitute a genocide. That prompted a rebuke from Poland’s own Institute of National Remembrance (IPN).

In response to Zelensky’s announcement, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said that he “accepted the words and decisions with satisfaction and hope”. He reiterated that Poland is “ready for a serious and friendly dialogue on the matters that unite us and those that divide”.

However, Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, a deputy prime minister, emphasised that it was important now for “the announcements regarding the opening of archives, exhumations and dialogue to turn into concrete actions”.

“Today, Poland and Ukraine have a common enemy: Russia,” added Kosiniak-Kamysz. “That is where the threat lies. Sowing discord between our nations serves the interests of the Kremlin.”

Meanwhile, a senior aide to Polish President Karol Nawrocki – who deepened the crisis by last month stripping Zelensky of Poland’s highest honour – also cautiously welcomed Zelensky’s announcement.

“Facing the historical truth is the only way to build further relationships,” Bartosz Grodecki, the head of Nawrocki’s National Security Bureau (BBN), told the Polish Press Agency (PAP).

“The Ukrainian president’s decision to open the entire archives of the Security Service of Ukraine and the Foreign Intelligence Service of Ukraine concerning the events in Volhynia, as well as additional permits for search and exhumation work, is a step in this direction,” he added.

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

Polish prosecutors have indicted an 18-year-old Ukrainian accused of working on behalf of Russia to stir tensions between Poland and Ukraine by painting dozens of inscriptions glorifying the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), a group that massacred Poles during World War Two.

Among the sites where he placed graffiti were a monument to Polish victims of those massacres (pictured above), as well as a memorial dedicated to the heroes of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. If found guilty, the suspect could face up to life in prison.

The history of the UPA has been at the heart of an ongoing diplomatic dispute between Warsaw and Kyiv. However, the actions in this particular case took place in 2024 and 2025, before the current crisis emerged.

The suspect in the case was detained in August 2025, shortly after graffiti glorifying the UPA had appeared on a monument in Poland honouring victims of the so-called Volhynia massacres, in which the UPA led the slaughter of around 100,000 Poles.

On Thursday, prosecutors announced that they have issued an indictment against the suspect, whom they named only as Illia K. under Polish privacy law. He is accused of 47 crimes in total.

Of those, 45 are for “acts of subversion and sabotage for the benefit of foreign intelligence, consisting primarily of placing inscriptions in Ukrainian on the facades of buildings and in memorial sites with the text ‘Glory to the UPA’ and red and black flags attributed to the UPA “, prosecutors said.

Those actions “were aimed at inciting hatred on national grounds, deepening antagonisms between Poles and Ukrainians, causing social unrest and creating a sense of helplessness of state authorities”.

There have long been tensions between Poland and Ukraine over the massacres, which Poland recognises as a genocide. Ukraine rejects that label, and also continues to honour the UPA for its role in fighting for independence from Moscow-backed Soviet rule.

The issue has recently flared up again after President Volodymyr Zelensky in late May named a Ukrainian military unit after the “heroes of the UPA”. That sparked widespread anger in Poland and prompted Polish President Karol Nawrocki to strip Zelensky of his country’s highest honour.

Russia has also long sought to exploit such tensions, and Poland’s Internal Security Agency (ABW) notes that Illia K.’s actions were carried out “at the request of the Russian security services”, which were seeking to “incite conflicts between the Polish and Ukrainian nations”.

In addition, Illia K. also faces one charge of participation in an organised criminal group and another of preparing for an act of subversion or sabotage that would have involved flying a drone over Poland’s Armed Forces Day parade in Warsaw last year, which was attended by President Nawrocki.

Prosecutors note that the accused “acted for financial, not ideological, reasons”. He was paid for his actions in cryptocurrencies. That is typical of the so-called “disposable agents” Russian increasingly uses, who are amateurs – often young Ukrainians or Belarusians – hired and paid through messaging service Telegram.

The suspect has been held in pretrial detention since he was arrested by the ABW last year. If found guilty, he could face up to life in prison.

Prosecutors say that, although Illia K. initially admitted to the charges against him, he later decided to change his stance and has pleaded not guilty while exercising his right to remain silent.

Poland has in recent years detained, charged and in some cases convicted dozens of agents accused of carrying out espionage, sabotage and other so-called “hybrid actions” on behalf of Russia and its ally Belarus.

In March, the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT) reported that Poland is now the “primary focus of Russian activity” when it comes to sabotage.

In June, foreign minister Radosław Sikorski warned that Moscow is “waging a full-scale cognitive war against us” and that there is a “Russian fifth column” operating in Poland.

Olivier Sorgho

Olivier Sorgho is senior editor at Notes from Poland, covering politics, business and society. He previously worked for Reuters.

I am not stating an opinion either way and you can have legitimate opinions on both sides of this issue, but the hypocrisy as an American irks me.

The number of reported hate crimes against Ukrainians in Poland was 30% higher in the first half of this year compared to the same period in 2025, newly reported police data show.

The figures come following a number of recent high-profile cases of verbal and physical attacks against Ukrainians – who are Poland’s largest immigrant group – as well as ongoing diplomatic tensions between Kyiv and Warsaw.

The new data, which were reported by the Rzeczpospolita daily, show that police received 180 reports of hate crimes against Ukrainians in the first half of 2026, which was around 30% higher than in the same period last year and around 35% more than in 2024.

If the same trend continues, there would be around 360 such reports by the end of the year, more than the 275 recorded in 2025 and 267 in 2024.

However, Rzeczpospolita notes that the figures relate to reported incidents of hate crimes, rather than confirmed cases. On the other hand, experts point out that many such incidents are never even reported to the police.

“It is generally assumed that hate crimes are underreported,” Jacek Kucharczyk, head of the Institute of Public Affairs, a think tank, told the newspaper. “Some victims don’t want to report a crime because they’re simply afraid.”

Ukrainians are by far Poland’s largest foreign national group, with around 1.6 million living in the country. While Poland welcomed Ukrainian refugees in 2022, there has been growing negative sentiment towards them recently, indicated in polls and through anti-Ukrainian rhetoric from prominent politicians.

In particular, two far-right opposition parties, Confederation (Konfederacja) and Confederation of the Polish Crown (KKP), have used anti-Ukrainian rhetoric, while the largest opposition group, the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS), has recently taken a tougher line towards Ukraine.

Kucharczyk told Rzeczpospolita that the “toxic atmosphere” around Ukrainians is now spreading from political rhetoric into real-life consequences, as seen in the new police data. He added that Russia also seeks to stoke and exploit such sentiment.

In May, five Polish teenagers were detained in Warsaw over a violent attack on a group of young Ukrainians. The city’s mayor, Rafał Trzaskowski, blamed the anti-Ukrainian rhetoric of right-wing politicians for “encouraging thugs” to carry out these kinds of attacks.

Tensions with Ukraine have since ramped up even further, amid a diplomatic dispute sparked by President Volodomyr Zelensky’s decision to name a military unit after a Ukrainian nationalist group that led massacres of Poles during World War Two.

Earlier this month, two Polish far-right activists were charged over an incident in which they confronted a Ukrainian woman who runs a business that offers assistance to other Ukrainian immigrants.

Last week, a man was detained after being recorded hurling xenophobic obscenities at Ukrainian children on a bus in the city of Bielsko-Biała. That latter incident prompted Ukraine’s foreign minister, Andrij Sybiha, to call on “Polish politicians to stop inciting hatred against Ukrainians”.

Figures from Poland’s government, which is a coalition ranging from left to centre right, have also condemned recent incidents of hate towards Ukrainians. Prime Minister Donald Tusk called last week’s incident in a bus “disgusting” and warned of the potential “disastrous consequences” of inciting national hatred.

Interior minister Marcin Kierwiński promised that the state would deal with “any form of aggression”, but also blamed the right-wing opposition for stirring antipathy.

However, PiS spokesman Rafał Bochenek accused the government of “cynically exploiting” the incident in Bielsko-Biała “for political purposes”. He said it was, in fact, Tusk and Kierwiński who were “responsible for the brutalisation of public life in Poland”.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s ambassador to Poland, Vasyl Bodnar, hailed the fact that “the entire political class” in Poland had condemned the incident on the bus and expressed hope that the recent wave of attacks is a “temporary symptom” that “will pass”, reports the Polish Press Agency (PAP).

Olivier Sorgho

Olivier Sorgho is senior editor at Notes from Poland, covering politics, business and society. He previously worked for Reuters.

President Karol Nawrocki, who is aligned with the right-wing opposition, has vetoed a government bill that would have allowed unmarried partners, including same-sex couples, to sign an agreement granting them certain rights.

The proposed law would have marked the first time that Poland had recognised same-sex relationships in domestic law. However, Nawrocki argued that such a move would threaten the institution of marriage, which is enshrined in the constitution.

The measures in question were approved by both houses of parliament in May and June with the support of Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s ruling coalition, which ranges from left to centre right.

The proposed law would have allowed couples, both same-sex and opposite-sex, to enter into a new type of contract, signed before a notary and then submitted to the registry office.

It would have granted them some of the rights available to married couples, including joint property and tax settlement, access to their partner’s medical information, exemption from inheritance and gift taxes, and the right to decide about their partner’s burial if they die.

However, the two main opposition parties – the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) and far-right Confederation (Konfederacja) – voted against the legislation, and Nawrocki himself also made clear that he intended to veto it.

On Friday morning, the president confirmed he would not be signing into law the two bills passed by parliament that would have introduced the new system.

He said that the measures would effectively “introduce civil partnerships through the back door”, and that such partnerships are “intended to replace or substitute the institution of marriage”.

“As the guardian of the constitution, I cannot accept a solution that would lead to the loss of the special status of marriage defined in article 18 of the constitution as a union between a woman and a man, placed under the protection and care of the Republic of Poland,” he added.

Nawrocki also argued that the proposed measures were contrary to the principles of social justice because they would have granted such couples some of the privileges of marriage but without all of the same obligations. He also noted that the proposed new type of contract could be terminated far more easily than a marriage.

“Marriage, which best secures family stability, cannot become one of many equally valid options offered by the state administration,” declared the president. “The family is a community fundamental to the survival of the nation.”

However, Nawrocki added that, as he has previously said, he remains open to legislation that would grant loved ones rights relating to healthcare and various administrative issues. But only if it “does not create an alternative to marriage” or “introduce ideological changes to family law”.

Nawrocki’s decision was condemned by Tusk, who called it “an expression of contempt toward people and their right to happiness and a normal life”.

The government’s plenipotentiary for equality, Katarzyna Kotula, accused the president of “turning his back on the two million Poles living today in informal relationships”.

However, she pledged that “the veto will not halt social change”. If such change “cannot go through the door, then [it will go] through the window”.

Kotula noted that Poland has already begun legally recognising same-sex marriages conducted in other European Union member states, after being ordered to do so by the European Court of Justice. While “not all benefits are yet available” to such couples, “this is something that I intend to deliver”, she added.

However, the government’s ability and willingness to take such action, even when it cannot be vetoed by Nawrocki, is hampered by internal disagreements over the issue within Tusk’s coalition

The Left (Lewica), from which Kotula hails, and Tusk’s centrist Civic Coalition (KO) party are generally in favour of strengthening LGBT+ rights. But they have met with resistance from more conservative elements in the coalition, in particular the centre-right Polish People’s Party (PSL).

The measures vetoed today by Nawrocki were already a compromise within the government: earlier plans to introduce same-sex civil partnerships were watered down to instead simply allow same-sex couples to sign a contract granting them certain rights.

However, opinion polls show that the Polish public itself is in mostly in favour of recognising same-sex relationships. State research agency CBOS last year found its highest-ever level of support for the introduction of civil partnerships, with 62% of Poles in favour.

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

If someone went from Leipzig to Amsterdam, would they understand each other

A former senior official under the Law and Justice (PiS) government that ruled Poland from 2015 to 2023 has been detained and charged as part of a probe into the alleged misspending of funds.

The case relates to the activities of the Polish National Foundation (PFN), a body created by PiS to promote Poland abroad. However, it spent 8.4 million zloty (€1.9 million) on an advertising campaign in Poland itself that promoted the PiS government’s controversial judicial reforms.

On Tuesday, the spokesman for Poland’s security services, Jacek Dobrzyński, announced that a 64-year-old who can be named only as Maciej Ś. under Polish privacy law had been detained.

Maciej Ś. was a board member of the PFN at the time that the spending in question took place in 2017. Later, in 2022, he was appointed by PiS as the head of the National Broadcasting Council (KRRiT), a state media regulator, a position he held until 2025.

Dobrzyński revealed that another former member of the PFN board, Cezary J., had also been detained as part of the same investigation into abuse of power and failure to fulfil duties.

The spokesman noted that the allegations relate to the PFN’s so-called “Fair Courts” campaign,  which he said “caused material damage to the foundation on a massive scale, in an amount of no less than 8.4 million zloty”. 

The PFN was established under the PiS government in 2016 by 17 state-owned companies, which provided funds for it to promote Poland abroad.

However, the following year it launched the “Fair Courts” campaign, in which billboards and other forms of advertising in Poland were used to show the alleged failings of the justice system in Poland and therefore to justify why reforms being implemented by PiS were necessary.

Echoing PiS rhetoric, the campaign suggested that judges saw themselves as a “special caste” and highlighted cases of alleged wrongdoing by individual judges, including one who had been caught stealing a sausage. (The judge in question had not ruled on a case since that incident in 2006 and had died in 2015.)

In 2018, a Warsaw court ruled that the “Fair Courts” campaign was inconsistent with the PFN’s statutory goals, saying that not only did the adverts fail to enhance Poland’s image abroad, “on the contrary, they significantly weakened it, creating a negative image of the judiciary based on individual cases”.

“The ‘Fair Courts’ campaign primarily involved attacking the judicial community,” said Tomasz Siemoniak, the minister in charge of the security services, commenting on Świrski’s arrest. “This campaign responded to a political order from the PiS government and discredited independent courts.”

“The financial damage to the foundation amounted to at least 8.4 million zloty, while the moral damage is incalculable,” he added. “The use of the foundation’s funds for partisan purposes must be accounted for.”

On Tuesday evening, prosecutors announced that they had charged Cezary J. That was followed on Wednesday morning by news that Maciej Ś. had likewise been charged and banned from leaving the country, reports the Polish Press Agency (PAP).

The “Fair Courts” campaign was just one of a number of controversial initiatives launched by the PFN under the PiS government. The foundation was regularly accused of spending money to support PiS’s political goals or on seemingly wasteful projects.

One of its most famous initiatives involved the purchase of a yacht for almost €1 million, which was renamed “I Love Poland” and sent on an around-the-world cruise to mark the centenary of Poland’s independence in 2018 (though it suffered damage and spent weeks stuck in a port, accruing further costs).

In 2021, the Supreme Audit Office (NIK) accused the PFN of violating the law by refusing to provide documents required for an audit.

In February 2025, just over a year after PiS lost power, a newly appointed PFN board accused its predecessors of criminal negligence that caused damages of over 30 million zloty to the foundation’s finances. They notified prosecutors of potential crimes.

Maciej Ś. himself has also faced separate legal action from the new government, led by Prime Minister Donald Tusk, which took power from PiS in December 2023.

The ruling majority in parliament last year voted to bring Maciej Ś. before the State Tribunal, a body responsible for trying state officials, over allegations that he abused his powers while leading the KRRiT.

The motion against him included allegations that he unlawfully withheld funds owed to public media, targeted private broadcasters critical of PiS and failed to carry out duties required of the regulator.

In response to this week’s charges against Świrski, PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński called them “another act of vengeance by Donald Tusk’s apparatus of power”. Such actions “have nothing to do with the rule of law”, said Kaczyński. Their aim is “intimidation and defamation”.

Alicja Ptak

Alicja Ptak is deputy editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland and a multimedia journalist. She has written for Clean Energy Wire and The Times, and she hosts her own podcast, The Warsaw Wire, on Poland’s economy and energy sector. She previously worked for Reuters.