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"No one was killed by the police, so it acted in an exemplary manner" - President Duda denies police brutality despite mounting evidence
- The police in Poland behave in an extremely professional way. In our country there are no cases of anyone being killed by the officers," President Andrzej Duda told TVN 24. "The unjustified use of...
27-01-2021 12:54 -
The plan to destroy Holocaust scholars. Polish Anti-Defamation League goes after the authors of the book "Night Without End"
When silencing Polish Holocaust scholars turned out to be impossible, the strategy became to brand them as liars and falsifiers of history. To do that, the ruling Law and Justice party set in motion...
23-01-2021 11:06 -
Poland's health care system in crisis: As COVID-19 ravages the country, the government fails to respond
During the pandemic, the Polish health care system had practically collapsed. The number of medical consultations, both with family physicians and specialists, dropped by one million. Hundreds of...
22-01-2021 13:54 -
Unlawful police violence against journalists must stop. We condemn the recurring assaults and demand accountability [Joint Statement from our Editorial Board]
Use of excessive force by the police against journalists covering protests is yet another step in the Law and Justice's long-running campaign that aims to intimidate and silence Poland's independent...
22-01-2021 11:33 -
A committee packed with PiS loyalists distributed PLN 6 billion in aid for local governments along party lines
Local governments headed by members of the ruling Law and Justice party received much more money under the Covid-19 financial support program than cities governed by the opposition. The decision was...
21-01-2021 16:44 -
The "art" of the deal: After taking over Polska Press newspapers, Orlen will still have to pay rent to the former German owner
The German owner of Polska Press media group, recently acquired by the Polish state oil giant Orlen, was preparing to sell the company already since 2016. Since then, the company managed to move its...
21-01-2021 11:36 -
17-year-old girl to stand trial for organizing a women's rights protest in a PiS stronghold
A local Police Department asked a court to punish the 17-year-old Małgorzata J. for offenses against public order. The girl organized a women's rights protest in the town of Limanowa- a PiS...
19-01-2021 13:57 -
Justice Minister unveils a bill to stop "arbitrary censorship" on social media platforms
Following the controversy surrounding President Trump's social media ban, Poland's Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro unveiled a new "freedom of speech protection" bill. The law seeks to establish a...
18-01-2021 17:48 -
Activists are standing trial for "blasphemous" Virgin Mary with a rainbow halo
The trial of three activists accused of offending religious feelings by placing stickers with the Virgin Mary adorned with a rainbow-coloured halo in the public space began on Wednesday in the...
15-01-2021 15:32 -
Prosecutor drops charges against far-right nationalists who threw a protesting woman down a flight of stairs
Citing a "lack of public interest", the district prosecutor's office dropped the case against a group of far-right nationalists who threw a protesting woman down the stairs at the Holy Cross Church...
15-01-2021 13:49 -
Poland's antitrust authority forbids the acquisition of Eurozet radio broadcaster by Agora
The president of Poland's central antitrust authority, Tomasz Chróstny, has blocked the merger between the radio broadcaster Eurozet and the media group Agora. - Concentrating nearly 70% of the...
14-01-2021 15:58 -
"Enough is enough"- struggling to make ends meet, ever more business owners threaten to defy lockdown restrictions
Individual anger at intransparent coronavirus restrictions is turning into a nation-wide social protest. The majority of Polish citizens oppose the government's decision to extend the national...
13-01-2021 16:32 -
Are you protesting? Prepare to pay. New draft bill makes it illegal to refuse police-issued penalties
The ruling camp wants to put a ban on refusing police-issued penalty notices. Should it succeed in passing the proposed legislation, appealing a fine in court will only be possible after it has...
11-01-2021 18:27 -
Arsonists are among us [MICHNIK]
The storming of the Capitol by the pro-Trump mob looked eerily similar to a coup.
11-01-2021 10:59 -
Strategic media takeover. How Orlen's purchase of Polska Press could shape the 2023 local elections
After taking over the publishing group Polska Press, the state-controlled oil giant Orlen will gain access to the data of some 17,4 mln users of local news portals. It will allow the company to...
08-01-2021 14:55 -
Women's rights activists launch legal action against the Polish government, taking their case to the European Court of Human Rights
-It's time we take our protest to court. Let us all take legal action and bring the case to the European Court of Human Rights- call the activists from the Federation for Women and Family Planning....
07-01-2021 14:48 -
Minister of Justice wants to challenge the constitutional validity of the EU "rule of law mechanism"
Displeased with the fact that Prime Minister Morawiecki did not veto the legal mechanism linking EU funds to the respect for the rule of law, Zbigniew Ziobro, the Minister of Justice, announced...
05-01-2021 13:01 -
For a Democratic European Power - Call to Citizens and Leaders of the Union [CIVICO EUROPA]
"Let us move from a system of weak cooperation to a project of common construction!"- renowned experts and public figures from across Europe call for greater unity among EU member states.
04-01-2021 10:34 -
The year PiS turned the screw on independent media [2020 in review]
It is difficult to overstate the scale of the assault on media freedom by the ruling camp in 2020. Over the last year, we have witnessed increased activity aimed at intimidating news outlets and...
31-12-2020 13:37 -
Hope in turmoil. With state repressions reaching new highs, civil resistance reaches an unprecedented scale [2020 in review]
The year 2020 in Poland will be remembered as the period of sharp confrontations between the authoritarian regime built by the ruling Law and Justice party (PiS), on one side, and the civil society,...
31-12-2020 13:33 -
Dreaming of a party-state, Law and Justice continues to quash the last independent bastions: courts and local governments [2020 in review]
This year marked the thirtieth anniversary of the creation of the local government in Poland. For many political scientists and activists, its establishment and development over the last three...
31-12-2020 13:29 -
PiS' media takeover by the state oil giant is a move straight out of the Russian playbook [Peter Wolodarski]
The consolidation of the state, oil industry, and the media is a well-known move from the Russian playbook; it should ring alarm bells for supporters of democracy worldwide.
21-12-2020 13:53 -
European Federation of Journalists: Media pluralism greatly endangered by Orlen's Polska Press takeover
A long-awaited drive by Poland's ruling Law and Justice party to bring independent media to heel has started with the planned purchase by Orlen, a state-controlled petro chemical giant, of Polska...
18-12-2020 17:41 -
Who will protect me from the police? [OPINION]
The police charged one of the female protesters during the Women's Strike with violating the physical integrity of an officer. She is facing up to three years in prison. Bearing in mind the many...
18-12-2020 13:57 -
National quarantine: Poland to go into lockdown shortly after Christmas
Closed hotels, ski resorts, shopping malls, and a night-time curfew from 7:00 pm on New Year's Eve - starting December 28, Poland is going into a national quarantine.
18-12-2020 12:20 -
Advocate General of the CJEU: Polish law excluding the right to appeal the selection of the Supreme Court judges violates EU law
Advocate General of the Court of Justice of the EU Evgeny Tanchev announced today that in his opinion the Polish law introduced in order to exclude the possibility for legal review of the National...
17-12-2020 15:46 -
In violation of patients' health record privacy, Women's Strike leader's COVID test result was leaked by state TV broadcaster
- I feel relatively fine. I'm working from home, and I haven't contacted anyone since I first noticed the symptoms- Marta Lempart, the leader of Women's Strike, tells us.
17-12-2020 13:11 -
Latest Kantar poll shows Law and Justice and the oppositional Civic Coalition in virtual tie. The ruling camp's approval ratings are sinking
For the first time since the 2015 parliamentary election, opinion polls show the ruling Law and Justice party in virtual tie with the oppositional Civic Coalition, each with an approval rating of...
16-12-2020 15:16