Poland - July 2023

The ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party pushed through amendments to controversial legislation passed in May to reduce the powers of the State Committee for the Examination of Russian influence on the internal security of Poland between 2007-2022. The changes were proposed by President Andrzej Duda and supplemented by the lower house, the Sejm. They were subsequently rejected in the opposition-held Senate, citing concerns that the Committee can be used to disadvantage the opposition creating an uneven playing field ahead of the upcoming autumn elections. The Sejm narrowly overturned the Senate’s veto (with 235 votes in favour, and 214 votes against). The amendments are intended to address domestic and international outcry over vulnerability of the body to politicization, for example by specifying that members of the Committee cannot be sitting MPs. Venice Commission experts issued an urgent opinion stating that the Committee, even with the proposed amendments, is not an appropriate approach to countering foreign influence, and lacks guarantees against political misuse.

Sources: Sejm, Council of Europe Venice Commission, Euronews, Notes from Poland, OKO Press

The European Commission (EC) will continue to withhold funds from Poland, expressing concerns about the independence of the judiciary in its 2023 Rule of Law report, published by the EC annually since 2020. In addition to long-standing issues, where the report noted no progress on six of the seven recommendations from last year’s report, the EC report also raised new concerns, including the potential for the recently created commission for investigating Russian influence on public officials to be used against the opposition. Weaknesses in media freedom were also raised in the report. The EC has withheld funds under various funding mechanisms, including in January 2023 for Poland’s pandemic recovery, as well as withholding cohesion funds, designed to support poorer EU member states in October 2022.

Sources: DW, European Commission, Notes from Poland, TVN24, Financial Times