On Thursday, the EU passed the delayed €1.8 trillion Euro budget and coronavirus recovery fund much to the relief of many of the bloc’s leaders. The fund was finally approved after Poland and Hungary removed their vetoes during the recent EU summit.

Polish Prime Minister Andrzej Duda and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban had blocked the approval of the budget last month, amid plans to link cash payouts to a nation’s respect for the EU’s core values.

Both Hungary and Poland are the subject of an Article 7 procedure — the EU’s so-called “nuclear option” which allows for nation states to be sanctioned if they are believed to be undermining democracy and the rule of law.

Judit Varga, Justice Minister for Hungary’s right-wing government, said she would challenge the new provision of making EU funds conditional on the bloc’s rule of law criteria in the European Court of Justice, but that never happened.

Poland and Hungary Have Suffered an Embarrassing Defeat

However, it is unlikely that this is going to be the end of the tale. Last week, a state-controlled Polish company said it would buy dozens of local and regional newspapers from a German media company, following years of calls for the “re-Polonization” of the media from Poland’s conservative Law and Justice party (PiS).

In Poland, the ombudsman’s office used to have the power to bring cases before the constitutional court and invalidate controversial legislation before the former became politicized.

According to the NGO Freedom House’s Nations in Transit report, which was released in May, Hungary is no longer a democracy due to the adoption of an emergency law that allows its government to rule by decree indefinitely, brought in after the coronavirus pandemic struck.

Therefore, the EU has its work cut out if it is serious about forcing Poland and Hungary to become more democratic. Yet the bloc failed to prevent both nations from sliding away from democracy this year, which shows how toothless the EU is.

The EU Cannot Force Poland and Hungary to Embrace its Version of Democracy

Making the coronavirus relief fund conditional on accepting the principles of rule and law and democracy may not be enough to persuade Orban and Duda to introduce democratic reforms. There is a strong possibility that both leaders have fooled the EU into believing that they will respect democracy and the rule of law just to receive the money they need to trigger an economic recovery in their respective nations.

Piotr Buras, Head of the Warsaw Office of the European Council on Foreign Relations, said EU member states should push for a transparent and fair mechanism of withholding financial assistance for countries ignoring the Court of Justice of the EU judgments relating to Article 2 of the Treaty of the European Union, which outlines the union’s core values. He added that such a mechanism would be a strong warning that solidarity and democracy are indispensable pillars of the European order. But because of the economic crisis caused by the coronavirus, there seems to be no appetite for such a measure.

Bold Choices are Needed in the Year Ahead

On September 9, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said the EU should proceed with integration without Poland and Hungary. Tom Theuns of EU Observer suggests that Rutte’s argument is correct because a new EU could be founded without Warsaw and Budapest. Such a move would be bold on the EU’s part, but doing nothing is not an option for them, and they cannot realistically do anything else to stop the Polish and Hungarian governments from pursuing their individual paths.

Also, neither Duda nor Orban seem serious about triggering Article 50 so that their respective nations can leave the EU. This means the bloc is stuck with the headache Poland and Hungary are causing them.

The coronavirus relief fund is a short-term victory for the EU. It is likely that the war Budapest and Warsaw want to wage with Brussels will continue into 2021, but what happens next remains anyone’s guess.

L'articolo What’s Next for Poland and Hungary Following Their Defeat by the EU? proviene da InsideOver.

The United States will relocate one thousand US soldiers to Poland. Warsaw hopes the decision will create closer ties to Washington and protection against threats from the East.

The Polish-US Agreement

Last week US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo traveled to Europe and visited four nations. During his stint in Poland he sealed the new military agreement between both countries.

Pompeo chose a symbolic day, August 15, for two reasons: While Catholics – Poland’s majority confession –  celebrate an important holiday, the Assumption of Mary, politicians also celebrated the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Warsaw with military bands and parades. From August 12-25, in 1920, Poland defeated the Soviet army in the so-called “Miracle of the Vistula.” It was a decisive battle that would later secure the country’s independence.

Pompeo and his counterpart Mariusz Błaszczak sealed an agreement that could have significant implications for Poland. The Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement will provide for the transfer of 1,000 additional US soldiers to Poland, in addition to the 4,500 already stationed in Poland.

Strategically Key Decision

A statement by President Trump published by the White House said that the agreement would intensify military cooperation between the two countries and further strengthen NATO’s deterrent force. During his visit to Warsaw, Pompeo said that the treaty opened the way to a larger rotating US troop presence. The latter was strategically crucial for the US and its allies alike.

Poland will provide the US soldiers with free board and lodging, fuel, storage space, and infrastructure, similar to other host countries of the US troops.

However, since there is no permanent US military base in Poland, the soldiers will not be relocated permanently but will be replaced by others on a rotating basis. The troops for this also come from the contingent of 12,000 soldiers that President Trump wants to withdraw from Germany. More than half of them will return to the USA. In total, 5,600 are going to other European countries, including Poland.

Poland’s Perspective

Above all, Poland hopes that the US troops will provide additional protection against possible threats and better defense. Poland’s ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party had long expressed its wish to strengthen NATO’s eastern flank. The latter should act as a deterrent, especially towards Russia.

If it were up to Poland, the agreement would go even further than the additional 1,000 soldiers. The idea of ​​a permanent military facility called “Fort Trump” has been suggested. However, the latter is very likely not currently feasible. Not because President Trump is not impressed by the idea, but because this plan could violate a treaty between NATO and Russia.

The strategic weights will, therefore, not be changed significantly with the relocation. Instead, a trend of recent years has been confirmed, according to which US troops are withdrawing more to their continent or are being relocated, primarily in Asia and thus in the vicinity of China.

Poland’s President Andrzej Duda doesn’t just see the relocation as a guarantee for more protection against possible aggressors. He also hopes that more security in the country and the region can also encourage businesses to invest more.

It also makes sense that the Polish President can envisage even stronger economic cooperation with the USA, including on energy policy. The traditionally already close ties between Washington and Warsaw could thus be tied even closer in the future. In any case, both sides left no doubt about the immense importance they attach to the Washington-Warsaw axis.

While “Old Europe” — France and Germany — in particular, are at odds with the Americans on several issues, Poland seeks to prove that it can become not only a viable alternative to the latter but also a more reliable friend than Paris and Berlin.

L'articolo America’s Defense Agreement with Poland proviene da InsideOver.

One of the most heated elections in Europe so far has ended in Poland, with the country’s National Electoral Commission declaring the incumbent President, Andrzej Duda, as the winner having achieved a vote share of 51.2 percent. It is Poland’s tightest presidential race since the end of communism in 1989.

The turnout for the election was 68.2 percent.

Trzaskowski Failed to Broaden His Appeal

The Civic Coalition’s (KO) candidate, Rafał Trzaskowski, failed to muster all the support from the other candidates such as Szymon Hołownia, who came third in the first round of the presidential election thanks to his campaign for ‘modern solidarity.’ This made it more difficult for Trzaskowski to topple his conservative opponent.

Trzaskowski also failed to take advantage of the votes right-wing nationalist Krzysztof Bosak won in the first round of the poll. Even though the KO’s candidate and Bosak share similar economic views, there is no doubt that many of the latter’s supporters ultimately lent their vote to Duda.

Now that Duda’s second term is secure, the Polish President has to ensure that he can heal the divisions that this election has caused. But now that he has secured a mandate for his policies and because of the Law and Justice’s (PiS) majority in Poland’s Parliament, it is unlikely that Duda will build bridges with those who voted for the KO in the second round of the presidential election.

What Duda’s Second Term Means for Poland

This will result in a lack of progress for those hoping to secure more LGBT equality in Poland. Throughout the election, Duda described LGBT rights as an ‘ideology’ more destructive than communism. Furthermore, the country has been called the worst nation in the EU for LGBT rights.

Duda will also proceed with his controversial judicial reforms that caused him to clash with the EU. The Polish President’s reform program involved a supreme court chamber to conduct disciplinary actions against judges. PiS believes that the country’s flawed transition to democracy in 1989 caused the judiciary to be expropriated by a post-communist elite. Meanwhile, those on the left condemn the reforms as an attack on the rule of law.

The Polish President will also position himself closer to the Trump administration (assuming the US President wins a second election) and drift apart from the rest of the EU. This will exacerbate the EU’s divisions as Duda will continue to align himself with anti-EU leaders such as Hungary’s Viktor Orban.

PiS Must Look to the Future

It is clear that the incumbent did not appeal to more liberal voters to secure his election victory, but under Poland’s constitution, a first-term president can only be re-elected once. Looking to the future, this means that although Duda will not contest the 2025 Polish presidential election, PiS, the party he is associated with, must appoint a candidate who can appeal to Poland’s more liberal voters if they want to prevent the next election from being so closely contested.

Duda’s voters tended to be concentrated in smaller towns, villages and older populations, while larger cities and women would vote for Trzaskowski. This election revealed how geographically and demographically divided Poland is. As the country’s more liberal voters expand in size, PiS would do well to drop its opposition to issues such as LGBT rights if it hopes to win the 2025 election with a broader coalition of voters. However, it is unlikely that this will happen by the time of the 2023 parliamentary election with Duda at the helm.

This election proved that PiS cannot continue to appeal to a narrow electoral base anymore and it exposed Poland’s polarized political divisions. Those voters Duda failed to appeal to will decide PiS’s fate over the next five years, which is why he cannot afford to take the electorate for granted anymore.

L'articolo The Consequences of Duda’s Victory in Poland proviene da InsideOver.

Last weekend, as Poles set out to elect their next president, Europe’s ideological divisions were thrown into sharp relief. In one corner, the incumbent Andrzej Duda — a man indicative of Eastern Europe’s growing conservatism — standing on a platform of nationalistic populism. In the other, Rafal Trzaskowski, a Europhile liberal and defender of minority rights.

Who Won Poland’s Election, Duda or Trzaskowski?

With the first-round votes counted, neither one had reached the requisite 50% (Duda took just under 44% of the vote, while Trzaskowski recorded just over 30%), triggering a runoff ballot to be held on July 12.

The decision ahead of Poles reflects a far wider crisis of unity afflicting Europe: the rise of nationalist governments who have generated controversy over their approach to press freedom and the rule of law in the East, versus the enduring liberal traditions of the West.

Though more moderate than, say, Serbia’s president Aleksandar Vucic or Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, Duda has much in common with these right-wing leaders.

Taking a Look at PiS

Poland’s ruling Law & Justice Party (PiS) — with which he is aligned — is wedded to a program of state transformation, including new laws that limit media freedoms and punish judges who are considered to have inaccurately maligned the government or ruled by activist sympathies. As president, Duda has waved through these measures, chipping away at Poland’s democratic credentials.

Yet, the 48-year-old still clearly enjoys significant support, even though he failed to meet the 50% threshold for a first-round triumph.

Duda’s Popularity is in Decline

Duda’s popularity is in decline, however. Prior to the COVID-19 outbreak, he looked set for a stonking victory. But the government’s lackluster performance on the pandemic and recent allegations of corruption have seen his support base ebb away.

The emergence of Trzaskowski — Warsaw’s cosmopolitan mayor — as a viable candidate has also stung the incumbent. Perturbed at the country’s trajectory under PiS’s brand of nationalistic conservatism, many Poles have turned to Trzaskowski in the hope that he will be a check and balance against the PiS’s right-wing policies. As president, the Warsaw man would have an effective veto on government legislation.

Gay Rights Becomes a Focal Point

Startled by Trzaskowski’s striking rise in the polls, Duda’s campaign shifted gears in the weeks running up to the first-round vote, forcing the conversation onto social issues. The rights of LGBT people has been a particularly fierce battleground.

Seeking support from Poland’s rural, Catholic voter base which remains staunchly against same-sex marriage — Duda has played the family values card, promising to protect the nation against the proliferation of “LGBT ideology.”

A strong supporter of gay rights, Trzaskowski has offered Poles a very different vision with regard to equality. Elements of the media — which various mainstream and left-leaning analysts say is largely under the thumb of the administration — have sought to turn this against the moderate candidate. Sieci, a pro-PiS weekly magazine, recently published a front-cover depicting a hooded Trzaskowski wearing a rainbow armband, with the caption: “the extremist candidate”.

What Happens Next?

This attempted character assassination appears not to have worked, however. By taking 30% of the vote, Trzaskowski has secured himself a strong position for the second-round runoff. Indeed, if electoral polling is to be trusted, he — not Duda — is the odds-on favorite to win the deciding ballot next month.

That would send a strong signal that Eastern Europe still holds dear the core democratic values upon which the continent is built.

L'articolo Poland’s Presidential Race Reflects Europe’s East-West Ideological Divide proviene da InsideOver.

Poland’s presidential election this year proved to be the most heated contest Poles have experienced in recent years. Not only has the nation been crippled by the effects of the coronavirus, but the election was also held against the backdrop of widespread flooding. It was also originally scheduled for May 10, but it had to be postponed due to COVID-19.

The final historic turnout stood at 64.51 percent, which shows that there is a growing interest in the country’s democratic process.

PiS Stormed Ahead in the First Round

Out of the eleven candidates who registered to stand in the general election, only two received a clear mandate to participate in a second vote scheduled for July 12th. President Andrzej Duda, the incumbent associated with the ruling Law and Justice Party (PiS), received 43.5 percent of the vote. He will face Rafał Trzaskowski, the Mayor of Warsaw. The latter received 30.46 percent of the vote during the first election and he is the candidate for the main opposition party, which call themselves the Civic Coalition (KO).

During the first vote, Duda attempted to rally his voters behind PiS’s social policies, including their stance on LGBT issues, with the incumbent President describing LGBT rights as an “ideology” more destructive than communism and abortion. He also highlighted his high-standing with President Trump.

The US President even endorsed Duda when the latter went to Washington to visit one of his closest allies. “He’s doing a terrific job,” Trump commented.

Meanwhile, Trzaskowski concentrated more on COVID-19’s consequences, women’s rights and maintaining a close relationship with the EU.

Duda Had the State Media on His Side

Duda’s first and only victory so far has demonstrated the incumbent President’s ability to manipulate the state media into supporting him. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) criticized the conduct of Duda’s campaign. Its statement read that state broadcaster TVP served “as a campaign tool” for the President, and some of its reporting contained “xenophobic and anti-Semitic undertones.” By referring to Trzaskowski as ‘a threat to Polish values and interests’, it failed in its duty to be impartial.

However, Gazeta Wyborcza reports that TVP suffered a stunning defeat as it failed to prevent Trzaskowski from soaring to second place. According to BBC News, even conservative daily Rzeczpospolita admitted that PiS support has been mobilized to the limit, which means Duda may have to build bridges with KO at some stage.

Holding the presidential election in June worked to KO’s advantage. If the vote had been held in May, the incumbent President would have stood a better chance of winning in the first round as he was riding high in the opinion polls then. If there is one lesson that Duda needs to learn from this election, then it is that he needs to broaden his base of support to win in the future.

Duda Must Broaden His Support to Win

The New Statesman’s Annabelle Chapman argues that the independent candidate Szymon Hołownia, who came a clear third during the first election, could provide Trzaskowski with the largest reserve of additional votes due to his campaign for “modern solidarity.” Trzaskowski could even eat into the support of right-wing nationalist Krzysztof Bosak, who came fourth, as he shares economic views which are similar to Bosak’s. This is despite the fact that many of the latter’s supporters may vote for Duda.

This could result in an extremely close result that will have major implications for Poland. Daniel Gleichgewicht of the New Eastern Europe highlights that a victory for the opposition could lead to a potential paralysis of the state as PiS hold the largest number of seats in Poland’s parliament. The President has the power to veto legislation, and a KO victory could thwart PiS’s parliamentary agenda.

If Duda wants to prevent such an outcome, he needs to broaden his image to win a vaster array of voters, and fast.

L'articolo The Lesson Duda Needs to Learn proviene da InsideOver.

Works are in progress in the easternmost periphery of the Old Continent to bring to life an ambitious project known as E40. The E40 is a waterway whose aim is to link the Baltic sea with the Black Sea by going through the countries in between the Russian sphere and Western Europe. It would be a modern-day water-woven Iron Curtain. The geopolitical consequences of the E40 are as high as the environmental risks and its eventual construction is set to profoundly shape international relations in Eastern Europe.

What is the E40?

The E40 project has been rumored since the early 2000s but was officially unveiled only in 2013. Specifically, it aims at constructing a 2,000 kilometres-long inland shipping route from Gdansk, Poland to Kherson, Ukraine, linking the Baltic sea and the Black sea via the Dnieper, Pripyat, Bug and Vistula rivers by going through Polesia, Europe’s Amazon. Scarce information is available about the project since little has been said until today, but the establishment of the 3SI, Ukraine’s continuing closeness with the West and the ongoing Belarus-Russia arm wrestling are reviving the debate.

Once completed, the E40 is estimated to permit the transit of 5 to 7 tons of goods annually, an incredible boost to the multilateral trade among the Baltic states, Poland, Belarus and Ukraine. Tens of thousands of jobs are expected to be created due to the necessity of a kilometres-long buildup of docks, storage facilities, distribution and sorting centers.

Key Urban Locations Boost Polish and Ukrainian Power

Furthermore, the rivers selected for the water corridor pass by, or in the vicinity of, vital business sites such as Kiev, Warsaw and Gdansk. In short, it is the perfect complement to the Polish dreams of regional hegemony and to the EU-US plans to reduce Russian exposition in the Eastern European nations as much as possible.

Warsaw has shown an increasingly willingness to link the E40 to the 3SI, which would mean access to EU funds, whereas Minsk stopped opposing any regional cooperation projects not contemplating the Russian participation and very recently has shown some interest in the E40 and in other multilateral initiatives with the 3SI members. Aleksandr Lukashenko’s endorsement is the game-changer that could allow the E40 to take form since no serious North-South corridor is thinkable without Minsk.

Where Does Belarus Stand?

Russian diplomacy seemed to have succeed in convincing Lukashenko to boycott the project so that to limit its geopolitical impact and economic potential, but in the recent months the Belarusian president changed his mind, proving again to the Kremlin that he is an unreliable partner and his double play seems now destined to give in to pressures from the Western flirting diplomacy. In the case Belarus ever decides to formalize its participation, its path to diversification and de-Russification would record an incredible boost in favor of the growing amalgamation with the Poland-centered new regional order.

Last September, Lukashenko said that the participation in the E40 is very important since it may allow Minsk to have access to the Black Sea. The same month, the then-Ukrainian minister of infrastructure, Vladislav Krikli, announced a €354,000 initial allocation to dredge 64.5 kilometres of the Pripyat river. Later that year, in December, officials from Minsk and Kyiv have signed a comprehensive agreement about the E40, as a completion to previous deals for the building of a port on the Dnepr and the joint effort to dredge the Dnieper and Pripyat rivers.

In the meantime, Poland is actively searching for investors. Polish officials aspire to attract at least €20 billion in investments and are even lobbying to the Chinese, trying to convince them of the opportunity to link the E40 to China’s Belt and Road Initiative.

What’s Motivating the E40 Project?

E40 is the official name given by the European Union to a waterway designed to increase the inter-dependence among the flyover-states-turned-big players of Poland, Belarus and Ukraine. It is one of the many monumental infrastructure projects which are being set up in recent years as part of the East-focused developmental agenda sponsored by the EU-US axis. One of its main purposes geopolitically is to widen the distance between Eastern Europe and Russia.

Until today, such distance was mainly political. The once Soviet-ruled and historically Russian-influenced countries have been gradually incorporated in the EU and in the NATO and then wisely converted in strongholds of Atlanticism. Russia could do nothing to prevent this Zbigniew Brzezinski-written scenario from taking place due to a series of circumstances and external factors, and now is more encircled than ever before. The likely entry into the EU and NATO in the next future of Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia ⁠— against the background of the E40 ⁠— is going to complete the encirclement.

The once-poor and underdeveloped Poland plays a key-role in this essentially anti-Russian power design by taking the lead in any considerable initiative endowed with the potential of shaping the regional dynamics, from the Visegrad alliance to the Baltic Fund, from the Intermarium-inspired Three Seas Initiative (3SI) to the dream of building a Warsaw-centered energy market covering even the Baltic states and Ukraine. It’s only by having a 360 degree view of the current historical context that it’s possible to understand the true meaning and importance of the E40.

Why the E40 is So Important

The geopolitical potential of the E40 is as high as the economic one. The waterway is designed to inter-connect deeply this post-communist region inhabited by some 90 millions people and whose anti-Russian standing is vital for the Western plans of containment and regional hegemony. Poland’s effort to link the E40 to the 3SI might justify the right to receive EU funds as well as the possibility to use the waterway for security reasons and not only for trade.

The overall outcome would be the official consecration of a new union within the European Union, acting as a modern-day cordon sanitaire capable of crystallizing the West-East divide and of making the post-communist players more amalgamated and cohesive. Russia’s influence over the region would record a tremendous hit from which it would be barely possible to recover in the case of Belarus’ effective participation.

Russia’s Cards to Stop the Project: the Environment and Donbass

The project is as ambitious as it is controversial since the environmental impact could be truly horrific in terms of loss of bio-diversity, destruction of wilderness, and the likely spread until the Baltic Sea of the contaminated waters nearby Chernobyl. The strengthening of this already-used used waterway will imply the construction of dams and locks, the interruption of meanderings, against the background of dredging and extension works to strengthen the river’s flow.

Several civic associations have been established so far to protest against the E40 for environmental reasons: BirdLife, BUEE and Bahna in Belarus, NECU and USPB in Ukraine, and OTOP in Poland. These associations are lobbying to their respective governments, exposing them the risks and the alleged anti-economic cost-benefit ratio emerged from their feasibility studies.

Welcome to Polesia

Polesia — also known as “Europe’s Amazon” — is set to be the most impacted area by the E40 and the repercussions of its artificial alteration are only partly predictable. The eighteen-million-hectares unspoiled region hosts several UNESCO-recognized protected reserves and more than 70 natural areas where dozens of thousands of animal species live and are now at risk of extinction, because some of them are endemic — namely they are based only in Polesia.

Russia is endangered by Belarus’ change of mind but Moscow has two cards to play and both of them are to be played in Ukraine: the environmental impact and the Donbass. In fact, the waterway pass by the Chernobyl exclusion zone — at its closest is only 2.5 kilometres from the nuclear reactor — and as various environmental organizations have pointed out there’s the concrete risk of making the contamination spread and threatening millions of people and animals. Russia’s approach is strengthened by these indisputable elements and it may use the already-existing environmental organizations to increase the bottom-up pressure against the E40.

The E40 is also vulnerable because of the Dnieper’s vicinity to the Donbass, where conflict between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed separatists is still ongoing. Acts of sabotage are relatively easy-to-make via Donetsk- or Lugansk-based fighters, a large-scale Ukraine-Russia war might still break out in the next future — the E40’s inherent geopolitical significance, the Western pressures over Belarus, the NATO question and other factors will influence the Kremlin’s behavior — and they could prove extremely useful to discouraging potential investors from committing to the project’s funding.

It is not possible to predict the future, but one thing is clear as day: the E40 is a modern-day water-woven Iron Curtain, an infrastructure whose eventual construction would profoundly shape international relations in Eastern Europe, and Russia will do anything to stop and/or to hinder its contruction. Even a war. Ukraine and Belarus are warned.

L'articolo E40: the Waterway That Could Change Eastern Europe’s Destiny Forever proviene da InsideOver.

Reportage / Society 27.01.2020

The Evil: Inside Auschwitz

«We had the Second World War, Hitler in our towns and homes. If we look at the facts closely, European societies, if not each single individual, deserved what was happening to them: their way of living was worth much too…

Ivo Saglietti

L'articolo The Evil: Inside Auschwitz proviene da InsideOver.

The EU’s existence is being tested on two fronts: following the Conservatives’ resounding victory in last week’s UK general election, Britain is set to leave the bloc on January 31st. But another EU country may also be about to leave without the need for a referendum: Poland.

The Polish Government has recently clashed with the country’s Supreme Court, which has warned politicians that their proposed judicial reforms threaten the primacy of EU law and could be an attempt to gag the judiciary. Poland has already been referred to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) regarding rules for judges.

These reforms would mean that politicians can dismiss judges if they questioned the Government’s judicial reforms. The Law and Justice Party (PiS) also wants judges to be punished for engaging in “political activity.” If the government questions the legitimacy of judges proposed by the National Council of the Judiciary, they could be handed a fine or even dismissed. These proposals are being debated next Thursday.

Whilst the Law and Justice Party argue that these reforms are needed to tackle corruption, the EU has accused them of politicizing the judiciary since they came to power in 2015.

This crisis has been brewing for some time. During his final days as the European Commission’s President, Jean-Claude Juncker said Poland is unlikely to leave the EU. He was asked by a daily Polish newspaper called Rzeczpospolitaon as to whether 2019 might witness a ‘Polexit’, to which he replied: ‘No.’ 

However, the country’s future inside the bloc is uncertain. The Law and Justice Party may take Poland out of the EU at some point for other reasons in any case, as they continue to clash with Brussels over environmental protection and migration as well. If another nation quits the EU at the same time as Britain, the consequences would be substantial.

Poland is one of the largest beneficiaries of EU cash. In 2017, they received $10 billion more than they paid into the bloc’s budget. If they left, the Polish Government would lose access to that cash. Jan Mus, a Polish EU expert based in Warsaw, said this cohesion fund could be used as a means to punish Poland for failing to integrate into the European project.

Equally, Mus also warned that such a move could undermine European integration altogether. This is because the Law and Justice Party enjoys a lot of support among its Eastern European neighbors, and throwing Poland out of the bloc could turn them against Western member states.

Because of the Polish Government’s differences with the EU, a Polexit would make the path towards European integration easier for other member states. Polish proposals to end the European Federation have not been met with enthusiasm by officials in Brussels.

Among other disagreements, PiS opposes the EU’s refugee quota system and has highlighted the need to strengthen external borders. Removing Poland from the bloc would be a significant blow to the Visegrad movement of Eastern European nations that consistently opposes steps towards a federal Europe.

Whilst a Polexit could risk further undermining the European project, keeping Poland in the EU also has its risks. Many Polish politicians are angry that tenders for investments in their country co-financed from EU funds often go to Western businesses, and their non-Polish shareholders profit from it.

If Poland retains its EU membership, this nation will also present a challenge to the European Commission’s new President, Ursula von der Leyen. She is yet to reveal how she intends to deal with this situation. Despite this, she could find she has to negotiate with the Polish Government because she emerged as a compromise candidate in part due to Warsaw’s and Budapest’s opposition to Dutch socialist Frans Timmermans, who is a harsh critic of the Law and Justice Party.

Throwing Poland out of the EU is a huge gamble for Brussels. It could either make it easier for those countries that choose to retain their membership of the bloc to integrate further, or it could act as a precedent for others to leave. From the EU’s perspective, this crisis could not come at a worse time.

L'articolo The Consequences Of Poland’s Legal Battle With The EU proviene da InsideOver.

The Vistula River is a natural border that splits Poland into two parts, the rich and liberal west part and the poor and conservative east part. It is here in eastern Poland that the discontent with the elites of Warsaw has grown. Entry into Europe has guaranteed better social and economic conditions, but not to the point of eliminating inequalities with the western part of the country. It was in eastern Poland that Jaroslaw Kaczynski, leader without office of the ruling sovereign party Law and Justice (PiS), aimed to win the elections. With a promise: reverse course. In the future, the west will go eastwards. It is the recourse of Poland B against Poland A, of Eastern Europe against Western Europe, of Christianity against secularisation.

And so Lublin, the heart of eastern Poland, has become in recent years the laboratory of Polish sovereignty. A sovereignty that has made the fight against immigration and LGBT rights (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) the focus of its strategy to achieve consensus. But what are the limits to this rhetoric? In Lublin, where an important community of Ukrainian migrants live, who arrived mainly after the war in Donbass, foreign labour is used to sustain the pace of production in the country. A precious resource for Poland, an economy that has never gone into recession despite the economic crisis that has hit both sides of the Atlantic. Yet the xenophobic rhetoric of the PiS risks making the country lose this fundamental resource, disputed as it is by another country that has a strong need for a labour force: Germany. And it is perhaps also for this reason that the Polish government has attenuated its anti-migrant rhetoric to focus instead on another “enemy” the LGBT community, which has become a symbol of the moral decadence of the West.

Before May, Europeans, or rather the PiS, unleashed a real war against what it calls the “LGBT ideology” a totalitarian thought promoted by the LGBT community to annihilate the nation in its deepest essence: the traditional family and the Christian values on which it is founded. In recent months dozens of municipalities and regions, including the voivodeship of Lublin, have declared themselves “free from the LGBT ideology”. This refers to a homophobic definition that evokes the macabre term ‘Judenfrei’ used by the Nazis to designate an area “cleansed” by Jews during the Holocaust, creating a pogrom atmosphere. This was impossible to imagine until recently especially in this corner of Poland, where the entire Jewish community – about one-third of the population of Lublin – was exterminated during the Second World War

L'articolo Poland at the crossroads proviene da InsideOver.

Every dawn there is a fresh exodus from Lutsk. At 05:30 the first bus leaves for Lublin. Half an hour beforehand the station is already filled by an unruly mob, frantic to get a ticket. The day begins thus and so continues until nightfall. A fleet of 13 buses and about 700 people leave this frontier town of western Ukraine for Poland every day.

They have 230 kilometres and six hours in which to find a job and a place to stay. You see them chatting, swapping information. Many already have friends and family waiting for them across the border. Others start on an adventure, at worst they can fall back on working in the fields. Now it is harvest time for apples, at the station in Lublin, there is always someone looking for workers.

Within a couple of hours Yulyia, 25, finds a job as a cashier at the Biedronka supermarket, almost a compulsory step for Ukrainian migrants. Yulyia has a degree in economics and speaks perfect English and Russian. Yet, in a Ukraine riven by nepotism and corruption, the only option is to leave, especially if, like Yulyia, you have a good level of education and a bit of talent but a lack of ‘connections’ to help you.

“Everything changed with the war,” says Yulyia. “Before, people emigrated to Russia. Some people from our area went to Poland because it is closer, but generally it was not a common destination.” The war in the Donbass region has therefore changed the direction of emigration. A significant wave of migrants fled westward, mostly to Poland.

As in all of Eastern Europe, labour is scarce there too. Since joining the EU in 2004, two million Poles have moved to Western European countries. Meanwhile, the economy has continued to prosper, to such an extent that Poland did not go into recession even when the financial crisis hit on both sides of the Atlantic.

To support this level of productivity, however, you need a workforce: in 2017 alone, 683 thousand residency permits were issued in Poland, 68% of which to Ukrainian citizens. This is a record in Europe – no country has ever before granted so many in a year, not even Germany or France. According to a rough estimate, there are about two million Ukrainians in Poland. This is the paradox of Polish nationalism: railing against immigration and yet not being able to do without it.

Lublin is the first leg of the journey for many Ukrainians, and often it is also the last. At the station, the bus stops are plastered with job adverts in Russian or Ukrainian. Particularly the Ukrainians from near the border, or those who are employed in seasonal jobs, remain here in the largest urban centre in eastern Poland. Three months in Poland equals one full year’s salary in Ukraine.

Dozens of people silently wait for their turn at the counter where residency permits are issued. It is a nerve-racking process that can drag on for months. At least eight if you’re lucky, but in the capital you can wait up to two years for a scrap of paper to make your status official. Iryna smiles a bitter smile, saying, “If only the problem were just the bureaucracy.” Originally from Kovel, a Ukrainian border town, Iryna, 24, moved to Lublin a year ago. At first she worked as a waitress in a restaurant. “I found it through someone well known here in Lublin, a kind of intermediary. I worked ten hours a day for three euros an hour. The hardest thing was to find a job with a formal contract.” Black market labour is such a widespread problem that it also makes the statistics for the Ukrainian population in Poland unreliable.

For example, in Lublin, there are less than three thousand registered Ukrainians, but according to marketing surveys carried out by the Polish telephone company Selectivv, there are at least 26 thousand.

By now Iryna has been officially hired as a sales representative in a services company, yet is paid less than her Polish colleagues. “Employers know that many Ukrainians are forced to emigrate, and they take advantage of it to violate our rights while making extra profit,” explains Vitaly Makhinko, president of the Ukrainian trade union Pracownicza Solidarnosc. “State bodies pretend not to notice. Furthermore, in Ukraine no policy protects the interests of its citizens overseas, so migrants are left to fend for themselves.”

Yet, according to Mr Makhinko, the living and working conditions of Ukrainians are slightly improving. “There is,” the trade unionist continues, “greater competition in the labour market, which is forcing employers to change and offer workers better contractual conditions. In the last five years, Ukrainians have gained professional experience and this increases their market value.”

Then, there is another factor driving both employers and the Polish government to improve treatment of Ukrainian migrants: growing demand from Germany for Ukrainian labour. “As soon as Berlin opens its borders, many Ukrainians working in Poland will move there, with the consequence that over time Poland will lose a large number. If Poland is now in second place (after Russia) in terms of the number of Ukrainian workers, in a few years it will be fourth. According to our forecasts,” Mr Makhinko concludes, “Russia will remain in first place, Germany will be second, Italy third, and Poland fourth.”

In the Lublin typography museum, Andrey wanders among the dusty volumes and then moves to magazines and film fragments that were circulated clandestinely in socialist Poland between 1976 and 1989. “This,” he explains, “is the mimeograph used to print the first issue of the underground magazine Zapis. It was also thanks to these publications that Solidarnosc [trade union] was born.”

Andrey, 33, has been working at the museum for a few years. From Lviv, a city in western Ukraine, he moved to Lublin to study international relations. A few short term jobs as an interpreter, then, after graduating, Andrey began the search for a permanent job. “It wasn’t easy. Ukrainians work in the fields, in supermarkets, at building sites, in restaurants. Finding a professional job is almost impossible around here. In some adverts, they explicitly say, “Polish citizenship required”. Even today, when I tell people I work in a museum, I can see the surprise in their eyes. To improve the situation we should first change immigration policy in Poland.”

Since he emigrated to Poland, Andrey has seen a growing sense of hostility towards Ukrainians. Here it has not taken much to bring old ill-feeling back to life, for example with the establishment of the memorial day on 11 July to commemorate the massacre of Volhynia, during which tens of thousands of Poles were killed at the hands of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. This skewed memorial omits Polish responsibilities and forgets the Ukrainian victims.

“There has been a change of mentality in Poland. Before, the people I met were more friendly. Now there is a lot of aggression, both on television and in the street. They shout anything and everything at you: killer, we don’t want you here. I have realised that to stay here I also have to be more radical, to be selective about who I spend time with. Otherwise,” concludes Andrey, “all that remains is to leave – after all, Poland is not the only place to live.”

L'articolo A New Life for Ukrainian Migrants proviene da InsideOver.