2024-10-14 15:06 update: 2024-10-15, 21:51
Photo: PAP/Paweł Supernak
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has said that the recent decision to temporarily suspend granting of asylum by the Polish state was a move motivated by the need to respond to the hybrid war conducted by Russia and Belarus against the European Union.
In recent years Poland has observed an escalation of the migration crisis in its eastern regions due to organised smuggling of people to the region by the governments of Russia and Belarus aimed at destabilising the European Union.
During Saturday’s convention of his party, the pro-EU, centrist Civic Coalition (KO), Tusk said that he will present Poland’s new migration policy on Tuesday at the meeting of his cabinet. He also announced that a temporary suspension to the granting of asylum will be included as part of it.
He added that the government will not recognise or implement European ideas, which could harm Poland’s security, such as the migration pact.
The decision prompted an outcry from human rights organisations, which deemed it "unacceptable". Amnesty International Poland wrote on the X platform that the right to asylum is guaranteed by the Polish constitution and the Geneva Convention. Maria Poszytek, a lawyer at the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights, told PAP that the idea is short-sighted and inhumane.
On Sunday Tusk addressed the issue on social media.
"Temporary suspension of asylum applications has been introduced in May by Finland. It is a response to the hybrid war conducted against the whole of the European Union (and especially Poland) by the regimes of Moscow and Minsk, consisting of mass-scale trafficking of people across our borders. The right to asylum is being used as an instrument in this war and has nothing to do with human rights," he wrote on the X platform.
"Guarding the borders and territorial security of Poland is and will remain our priority," he added. "Our decisions and actions will be unconditionally subject to that."
On Monday Tusk’s statements were discussed by Adam Bodnar, the justice minister in his cabinet and known human rights activist.
"In my view, a middle ground must be found between that which has been postulated with regard to guarding the borders and that which is mandated by international obligations," he told private broadcaster TOK FM.
"We have a very difficult situation on our hands," he continued. "On the one hand we have immense pressure stemming from the hybrid war and as a result, a sense of danger to our security... On the other hand, however, we have constitutional and international obligations."
"We have Article 56 of the constitution, which states the right to asylum, we have the Geneva Convention. We also have the need to abide by that which is widely known as European values and the right to asylum is part of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union."
Bodnar added: "However, I would like to highlight the fact that these constitutional values, Article 56 in particular, must be considered in the deliberations on this decision."
Article 56 of the Polish constitution states that foreigners can invoke the right to asylum in Poland within the conditions outlined in the legislation, it also declares that a foreigner fleeing from persecution can be granted refugee status in accordance with international law, which is binding in Poland.
Later in the day, Szymon Holownia, the leader of the centre-right Poland 2050, one of the parties making up the current coalition government, commented on the situation to present the position of his grouping.
"We stand our ground, upholding that security is unconditionally the most important, but security does not exclude humanity," he wrote in a post on Facebook.
"We agree that it must not be allowed (for the border - PAP) to be crossed by anyone illegally, as under the conditions of the hybrid war declared on us by Russia, this constitutes a fundamental threat to the security of Poland and the EU," he added.
Regarding the demands on the EU, Holownia wrote that Poland 2050 expects "the Polish government to do everything to make the EU finally take responsibility for its external border."
Referring to the planned restrictions on the right to asylum, he said: "We take the position that the right to asylum is 'holy' within international law and stems from the conventions ratified by Poland."
He added: "If the prime minister’s words will tackle a form of legislation, we will table appropriate amendments, unless the issue gets resolved in the government." (PAP)
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