POLAND: PM Meets Zelenskyy & more – 16th Jan 2025

Witam from BA! This is the Rorshok Poland Update from the 16th of January twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what's going down in Poland.

Let’s start off with foreign affairs. On Wednesday, the 15th, Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian President, visited Warsaw to meet with Donald Tusk, the Polish Prime Minister. They discussed Ukraine’s EU accession, with Tusk promising to move the talks along while protecting Poland's national interests. Poland also offered to be Ukraine's key partner in post-war rebuilding and proposed hosting a summit to coordinate efforts.

The Volhynia massacres, where Ukrainian nationalists killed Polish civilians as a part of ethnic cleansing during WWII, were part of the talks, with Ukraine supporting Poland's efforts to recover and bury the victims.

Lastly, Tusk condemned Russian threats and sabotage, and both leaders signed a joint statement urging allies to maintain sanctions on Russia and continue military support for Ukraine.

Speaking of the Volhynia massacres, on Tuesday, the 14th, Hanna Wróblewska, the Minister of Culture, said on social media that there should be standards on exhumation, search, and commemoration of Polish victims in Ukraine, independent of political or historical contexts. She also thanked the Polish and Ukrainian teams for their efforts and announced a meeting on the 20th of January to establish joint protocols. Tusk thanked the Polish and Ukrainian Ministers of Culture for their cooperation.

As for security, on Friday, the 10th, a commission investigating Russian and Belarusian influence in Poland presented a report at a conference, saying that Poland’s response to disinformation threats and efforts to counter propaganda, psychological campaigns, and cyber-attacks have been insufficient since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The report shows that Poland spends four billion dollars annually on fighting disinformation, but lacks a long-term strategy and has poor coordination among institutions. The commission urged the government to allocate more funds to the intelligence sector, improve cooperation with the media, and create an efficient anti-disinformation strategy.

Last week, we reported that Jerzy Owsiak, the founder of Poland’s biggest charity, the Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity or WOŚP, received death threats due to his public activity and political views. On Thursday, the 9th, Tomasz Siemoniak, the Minister of Internal Affairs, said that police arrested the suspect in southern Poland and transported him to Warsaw for prosecution. Depending on the evidence, the court may fine him or sentence him to three years in prison.

What's more, Owsiak accused conservative media outlets like Republic Television and wPolsce24 of spreading hate and lies when they said that WOŚP mismanaged flood relief funds for victims of the September twenty twenty-four flood. Tusk defended WOŚP, calling the accusations politically motivated and emphasizing the organization’s charity work.

Let’s hop over to the election campaign. On Saturday, the 11th, Karol Nawrocki, the Law and Justice party presidential candidate, attended the seventeenth annual Patriotic Pilgrimage of Football Fans at Jasna Góra, a city in southern Poland. He spoke to attendees after the church service when some fans chanted anti-communist slogans referencing the Soviet Union's hammer and sickle symbol.

Politicians like Rafał Trzaskowski, the Warsaw mayor, and Andrzej Dera, an aide to President Andrzej Duda, criticized Nawrocki for holding his presidential campaign at religious sites and seeking support from radical groups.

Meanwhile, Nawrocki called allegations of connection to neo-Nazi groups political manipulation and said the chants were part of football culture.

On Tuesday, the 14th, Mateusz Morawiecki, the former Polish Prime Minister, became the leader of the European Conservatives and Reformists party or ECR, succeeding Giorgia Meloni, the Italian Prime Minister. The ECR includes parties like Poland's Law and Justice, Italy's Brothers of Italy, and Sweden Democrats, representing conservatives in the European Parliament. Morawiecki will focus on boosting Europe's economy and strengthening conservative parties across the continent.

Up next, new laws. On Friday, the 10th, Tomasz Siemoniak, the Interior Minister, said in a press conference that the government would update the law on minorities to better address current issues and needs. Poland updated this law in two thousand four after joining the EU, allowing the use of any minority languages in public offices and the installation of bilingual signs where these languages are widely used, with German and Ukrainian being the most recognized.

The Joint Commission of the Government and National and Ethnic Minorities, set up in two thousand four, will create a group to assess minority needs like language rights, education, and cultural preservation, and will begin discussions on the law soon. The first steps will include funding for German minority language education and the creation of a National and Ethnic Minorities Council to represent minorities in policymaking.

On Wednesday, the 8th, the Ministry of Family, Labor and Social Policy announced a new law on financial support for widowed pensioners. Starting from the 1st of January, twenty twenty-five, widows and widowers can either receive fifteen percent of their deceased spouse’s pension apart from their own, or the pension their deceased spouse would have been entitled to plus fifteen percent of their own pension.

Men aged sixty or older and women aged fifty-five or older, who lived together until their spouse's death, and have not remarried, can apply to the Social Insurance Institution and receive their first payments starting from the 1st of July, twenty twenty-five. The government created this law to help pensioners facing financial struggles after the death of a spouse.

On that note about the elderly, starting from the 1st of January twenty twenty-five, all Polish citizens who turn 100 will automatically receive a monthly benefit of 6,246 zloty or 1,500 dollars, without needing to apply for the benefit and regardless of other pensions. Previously, centenarians were only granted financial benefits when they applied to the Social Insurance Institution for support, but the amounts were not fixed. There are currently around 6,000 people over 100 in the country.

Meanwhile in the education field. On Sunday, the 12th, Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, the Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister, said that starting from September twenty twenty-five, a health education subject will be voluntary rather than mandatory in all schools. The new subject, which includes sex education topics, sparked heated discussions.

In December twenty twenty-four, conservative groups protested in several cities, including Kraków, Szczecin, and Radom. The conservative Polish People's Party and the Catholic Church believe that sex education should remain in parents' control and that the state undermines parental authority.

On the other hand, the Ministry of Education says the curriculum will be free from ideological influence and will provide only scientifically-based information on sexual and reproductive health.

Still on health, on Wednesday, the 8th, doctors at St. Barbara's Hospital in Sosnowiec, a city in southern Poland, performed a successful operation on a patient with atherosclerosis, a disease where fatty deposits block blood flow in the arteries using a membrane from a cow's heart to reconstruct blood vessels in the patient instead of synthetic prostheses, which are more likely to get infected. More than six million Poles suffer from atherosclerosis due to unhealthy diets, obesity, smoking, or drinking too much alcohol. This technique improves the chances of saving the patient’s limb, particularly for those with atherosclerosis in their arms or legs.

On another scientific progress. On Tuesday, the 14th, a team of students from the University of Science and Technology in the southern city of Kraków sent the country's smallest satellite, called HYPE, into space aboard the SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket.

The five-centimeter cube satellite will reach 525 km or 326 miles above Earth and study environmental issues like light pollution and volcanic dust using a small spectrometer. The team will also receive photos of the earth's surface via an antenna at the University's Center for Space Technologies building.

Future missions will include a larger satellite with a hyperspectral camera and an experimental laser communication module.

Wrapping up this edition, heavy snow and blizzards hit Poland, and on the night from Tuesday, the 14th, to Wednesday, the 15th, 573 trains were delayed due to freezing rain and ice buildup on railway tracks. Trains between Warsaw and Olsztyn, a city in northeastern Poland, took almost ten hours to reach their destination, instead of the usual three. Polish State Railways canceled some trains and replaced them with alternative connections and buses. The situation has stabilized, and all routes are open again.

And that's it for this week!

Thanks for tuning into the Rorshok Poland update. You can connect with us on social media as @rorshokpoland on Twitter and Instagram.

Do zobaczenia!