EU official not satisfied with Warsaw response on rule of law: report

At a weekly meeting of EU commissioners, Timmermans on Wednesday said he had received a reply from Warsaw to recommendations issued by the European Commission in December.

The recommendations - on resolving a crisis centred around Poland’s top court - followed sweeping legal changes introduced by Poland’s ruling conservatives.

Poland’s PAP agency cited an unnamed source “close to the European Commission” as saying that Timmermans concluded that Warsaw’s response did not contain anything new except personal attacks on him.

Timmermans said that "we are not moving forward", PAP reported.

According to the source cited by PAP, Timmermans said that he may request a debate on Poland at a meeting of EU countries’ European Affairs ministers.

Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski said on Tuesday that he considers the issue of the state of the rule of law in Poland a “closed” case.

Rule-of-law probe

In January last year, the Commission, the EU’s executive arm, announced it was starting a "rule-of-law" probe into whether laws pushed through by Poland’s ruling conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party violate EU standards. PiS has fiercely rejected such accusations.

Critics have accused the governing Law and Justice party of aiming to stack Poland’s top court, the Constitutional Tribunal, with PiS supporters, undermining its ability to challenge new laws.

Law and Justice argued it was unfair that a constitutional court with a majority of judges appointed under the previous parliament should be able to scupper flagship policies for which PiS secured a mandate in democratic elections in late 2015.

(pk)

Source: PAP