POLAND: Consulate in Russia Closed & more – 17th July 2025

Witam from BA! This is the Rorshok Poland Update from the 17th of July twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what's going down in Poland.

In foreign affairs, on Friday, the 11th, Poland’s foreign ministry said Russia will shut down the Polish consulate in Kaliningrad on the 29th of August, as payback for Poland closing the Russian consulate in Kraków back in May.

Poland expected this move but called it unfair, saying Poland doesn’t carry out sabotage or hostile actions on Russian soil like Russia does in Poland.

In May twenty twenty-five, Poland accused Russian spies of starting a fire that burned down the Marywilska forty-four shopping center in Warsaw on the 12th of May, twenty twenty-four. Polish officials said that Russian intelligence ordered the sabotage. Russia, of course, denied any involvement.

Only one Polish diplomat will have to leave Russia. The ministry also urged Polish tourists to avoid traveling to Russia.

A few days later, on Wednesday, the 16th, Russian drones attacked a Polish-owned wood flooring factory in Vinnytsia, Ukraine, injuring six workers and causing a big fire. No Polish citizens got hurt. The factory faced a coordinated strike from three directions during a larger wave of drone and missile attacks in the region.

Emergency teams from Ukraine and Poland quickly put out the fire and helped the injured.

Poland condemned Russia’s actions and summoned a Russian embassy official to protest.

Next up, on Tuesday, the 15th, the Polish Border Guard and the EU’s Frontex teamed up to deport forty people they saw as a threat from Poland. A plane took twenty-seven Georgians and thirteen Moldovans from Radom airport out of Poland.

Since the start of twenty twenty-five, over 4,600 foreigners have left the country, some on their own, others forced. Many had criminal records, were caught sneaking across borders, or tried to get back in using fake information.

Talking about immigration, on Saturday, the 12th, Radosław Sikorski, the Foreign Minister, posted a video message on Twitter, calling out a rise in racism and antisemitism in the country, highlighting incidents linked to anti-immigrant attitudes.

Sikorski talked about locals in the city of Zamość, in southeastern Poland, who verbally abused foreign artists at a festival by calling them a refugee invasion. He also mentioned messages left near the Jedwabne massacre memorial in northeastern Poland that wrongly suggested Jews lived peacefully in Nazi-occupied Poland.

Sikorski said Poland could control immigration and there shouldn’t be any hate. He asked everyone to calm down and stop spreading hate because it’s making Poland look bad and pushing it away from the civilized world.

Speaking of Sikorski, on Friday, the 11th, he condemned Grzegorz Braun, an ultra-conservative MP, for two incidents on Thursday, the 10th, when Braun denied on a radio show that gas chambers existed at Auschwitz and tried to block a memorial for Jewish massacre victims. Sikorski also brought up how Brown had messed up a Hanukkah event in parliament on December twenty twenty-three.

Sikorski believes that Braun’s actions damage Poland’s international reputation and give Russia material to criticize Poland internationally.

The Auschwitz Museum and the national institute that investigates crimes from the Nazi era also spoke out against Braun, saying his allegations were totally false and harmful.

Polish prosecutors are investigating the incident under Article fifty-five of the Institute of National Remembrance Act, which says denying the Holocaust is a crime and can lead to up to three years in jail.

Also on Friday, President Duda pardoned Robert Bąkiewicz, an ultra-conservative activist who pushed a women’s rights protester during the twenty twenty abortion law protests.

He no longer has to perform community service but still has to pay 2,300 dollars in fines and damages, and the conviction will stay on his record. Lots of progressive politicians criticized the pardon, saying it was a harmful decision that ignores justice.

Lately, Bąkiewicz has been organizing citizen patrols along Poland’s border with Germany to keep an eye on migrants crossing. However, the government said that’s illegal since only official border authorities are allowed to stop or search people.

The prime minister even told these groups to back off and warned them they could face legal action if they acted like the police.

In another legal case, on Wednesday, the 16th, Polish prosecutors asked the Supreme Court’s Chamber and the State Tribunal to lift judicial immunity for Małgorzata Manowska, the First President of the Supreme Court of Poland. They accused her of abusing her power by validating the votes of the Supreme Court Board without enough members present. They also accused her of refusing to hold a mandatory State Tribunal meeting, and ignoring a court order about a suspended judge.

The investigation started after judges and lawyers complained. If approved, this would be the first time a sitting Supreme Court chief faces criminal charges.

Manowska says she did nothing wrong and followed the rules.

On Wednesday, the 16th, Piotr Serafin, the EU Budget Commissioner, said that Poland is going to keep getting the most money from the EU’s development funds in the new twenty twenty-eight–twenty thirty-four budget.

The EU plans to draw up a huge two trillion dollar budget, with Poland getting over 110 billion dollars for regional development and farming.

The budget covers initiatives such as supporting rural areas, ensuring food security, implementing social programs, addressing migration, and improving border security.

There’s also a big new 450 billion dollar fund to boost Europe’s industries and tech, which allocates lots more cash for research, digital projects, clean energy, defense, and the space industry.

However, the budget is not finalized yet. It still needs approval from all twenty-seven EU countries before it can move forward.

Meanwhile, on Monday, the 14th, Poland’s Infrastructure Ministry announced a new law that will require kids under sixteen to wear helmets when riding bikes, e-scooters, or electric skateboards.

The National Road Safety Council agreed to this to help keep children safer, responding to parents' concerns.

The ministry will add the rule to the traffic law, and it should take effect this fall.

It hasn’t set the fine for breaking it yet, but it plans to launch a campaign to encourage people to wear helmets.

In previous shows we mentioned that Polish astronaut Sławosz Uznański-Wiśniewski went to the International Space Station to conduct scientific experiments and educational projects. Now, on Tuesday, the 15th, he safely returned to Earth, landing in the Pacific Ocean near California after his mission.

He then flew to Houston, where a Polish government plane picked him up and then flew him on to Cologne, Germany.

Now, he’ll spend about a week at a European Space Agency medical center in Cologne to adjust back to Earth’s gravity before heading home to Poland next week. Uznański-Wiśniewski said the mission was the toughest but most important thing he’s ever done.

Even though the trip back is done, scientists will spend up to a year analyzing experiments from the International Space Station, and Poland’s space agency will create educational materials from the mission’s photos and videos.

In cultural news, on Friday the 11th, a new exhibit in the Museum of Gdańsk in northern Poland, called Our Boys, sparked controversy over its title, which President Duda, the defense minister, and other officials said blurs the line between Nazi soldiers and Polish victims.

The exhibit shows how thousands of ethnic Poles from the Pomeranian region in northern Poland were forced to fight in the German army during WWII.

While the government criticized the name, it admitted the topic is worth remembering.

The museum said that many critics haven’t even seen the exhibit and that it tells real stories of people who had no choice, some of whom later joined the resistance.

The show runs until May twenty twenty-six.

Finally, on Tuesday, the 15th, Polish activists from the Civil Affairs Institute wrote an open letter on its website urging parents to think twice before letting their kids use smartphones too early or too much.

They warned that phones can be as addictive as alcohol or drugs, especially for kids under fourteen. They said too much screen time can cause health problems, like bad eyesight, and mental issues, such as anxiety, and aggression.

The activists also pointed out that countries like Portugal and Italy are already banning phones in schools and criticized big tech and phone companies for profiting from kids’ phone use.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

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