POLAND: Illegal immigrants & more – 25th July 2024

Witam from BA! This is the Rorshok Poland Update from the 25th of July twenty twenty-four. A quick summary of what's going down in Poland.

To start off, remember that last week the MPs rejected the long-expected bill to legalize abortion for up to twelve weeks of pregnancy? On Tuesday the 23rd, All-Poland Women's Strike organization kicked off nationwide protests in front of the Parliament. Women expressed their disappointment in the Polish People’s Party, which rejected the pro-abortion proposal despite being a part of the progressive ruling coalition. Demonstrations also took place in other cities, such as Olsztyn, Szczecin, Kraków, and Poznan. 

Donald Tusk, the prime minister, said he wanted to attend the protest in front of the parliament but he could not because of other plans he had committed to on that day. On the issue, the Rzeczpospolita newspaper published a poll showing that only twenty-four percent of Polish people supported the parliament’s rejection of legalizing abortion. Forty-five percent said they were against the parliament’s decision, while twelve percent expressed their indifference. This last group, the nineteen percent, said they had not heard about the decision. The results showed that the Polish are actually more progressive on abortion than the MPs in the parliament.

The Polish government has been saying for months now that Belarus and Russia are bringing immigrants from the Middle East on purpose, and this week they shared some evidence. On Tuesday the 23rd, Czesław Mroczek, the Deputy Interior Minister said that Russia and Belarus cooperated with Hezbollah's military wing and Palestinian Jihad organization to push more illegal immigrants from Belarus to Poland and destabilize Polish and the EU border. 

This week, authorities dismantled a criminal organization led by a 33-year-old Syrian national who smuggled immigrants from Syria, Yemen, and Iraq to Poland through Belarus. Mroczek said the organization earned 580 million dollars alone in human trafficking to Poland and other EU countries. He also added that Poland worked with the Israeli Ministry of Defense in the operation and that Israeli authorities identified the criminal organization’s cryptocurrency wallets, where they stored their earnings.

On a related note, on Monday the 22nd, Polish Radio 24, a news radio station, said that Russia and Belarus secret services are responsible for recent fires in important business centers. In June, a fire totally destroyed a shopping mall called Marywilska 44 in Warsaw. Another fire broke out last week and damaged fifty-five thousand square feet of warehouse in the Nowy Port area, in Gdańsk city. The radio station said both countries recruit new members each day in Poland to involve them in these sabotage activities, and recruited people sometimes do not even know whom and what they work for.




In light of difficult relations with Russia, the country is getting rid of Soviet-era heritage. On Monday the 22nd, authorities removed The Brotherhood in Arms, a Soviet-era monument made in nineteen seventy-two, in Nowogard. The monument featured two medieval knights alongside a Soviet soldier and a soldier of the communist-led Polish People’s Army, which showed the cooperation between the Soviet Union and Polish communists of the time. Marcin Górka, the spokesman of the Institute of National Remembrance, or IPN, stated that there is no place for glorifying Soviet criminals in the public space and that the Soviets brought oppression, rape, murder, and robbery to the country. The removal of the monument took place in a ceremony with the participation of politicians such as the city council members, the mayor of the city, and the president of the IPN.

After long discussions between the opposition and the ruling coalition, on Thursday the 25th, the parliament accepted the changes to the country's Constitutional Tribunal, a high judicial body responsible for reviewing the constitutionality of laws and acts of the government. The new changes will restore the rule of law principle on the Constitutional Tribunal, as the EU forced Poland to make necessary changes in previous years. Normally, the parliament selected the members of the tribunal, which was against the principle of the rule of law because the judiciary should be independent and a political entity should not influence judicial processes. The new changes will now scatter the judge selection process to multiple other judiciary committees, such as the country’s National Council of the Judiciary, on the principle of merit, not political influence.

Also, the new changes will replace the existing judges and invalidate some of their past decisions. In the past, the Constitutional Tribunal made some decisions against the EU treaties and laws under the political influence of the Law and Justice government. This should not have been the case because every member state promised to obey the EU laws from the moment Poland entered the EU. The new changes will invalidate these past decisions.

Following the decision, the main opposition party and the previous government, Law and Justice, said they opposed the changes. Moreover, there is one more big obstacle against the changes, and it is President Andrzej Duda, since he implicitly supports Law and Justice. He may veto the parliament’s decision because, in order for the parliament’s decision to take place, the president has to accept it too.

Moving on to health, on Thursday the 18th, doctors expressed their concerns about rising cases of measles among children because parents increasingly refuse the mandatory vaccines for them. According to the data from the United Nations, nine percent of children born in twenty twenty-two in Poland did not receive their first dose of the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine, and only seventy-one percent of children received the second necessary dose. This number falls short of the ninety-five percent threshold for the second dose needed for herd immunity in the country. Although there is no data yet for twenty twenty-three and this year, doctors said these figures will be even worse. They worry because the outbreak of measles is the first indication that a country does not have a proper vaccination program, as seen in some low-income countries in the world. Izabela Leszczyna, the health minister, announced the ministry’s plans to educate parents who reject vaccines about the importance of vaccination.

On foreign relations, on Sunday the 21st, Prime Minister Tusk posted on Twitter a warm farewell message to Joe Biden, the US President who announced that he is withdrawing from candidacy for the upcoming presidential election in the US. The prime minister thanked the president for his efforts and said that he made so many difficult decisions that made Poland and America safer. 


Let’s move on to employee wage data research. On Tuesday the 23rd, Antal, the international global recruitment firm, published a report showing that the employees of the IT sector have the highest wage in the country. According to the figures, a person working as a Chief Information Officer or Chief Technology Officer receives a wage ranging between 13,000 and 17,000 dollars per month. When it comes to lower positions in IT, a security engineer earns up to 6,500 dollars. The finance sector holds second place after IT, and a financial director can claim up to 10,000 dollars. Following the financial industry is marketing. Key Account Managers in important marketing sectors, such as the pharmaceutical industry, can earn 5,000 dollars per month.

In a sports update, the parliament also decided to fund Polish athletes who join international competitions, such as the Olympics. The government now will give a scholarship equal to one minimum wage, which is 1,100 dollars gross, to athletes who rank at least eight in their branch, as long as they do not give up their sports. Also, athletes who receive medals in competitions will receive prize money of up to 25,000 dollars. The government said the decision will prevent athletes from quitting sports due to financial difficulties.


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

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Do zobaczenia!