“The policy change that the new Prime Minister Donald Tusk introduced in Poland when he took office in December is already being honored with huge financial support from Brussels,” notes the German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung on Friday (March 1, 2024).
As we read, the European Commission spokesman emphasized on Thursday that this is not a political decision intended to “reward” the change of power in Poland, but is substantively justified because Poland has taken specific steps to restore the independence of the judiciary and prosecutor’s offices.
“However, whether the Polish justice system has actually regained its full independence is debatable,” we read. The newspaper notes that the changes have not yet taken the form of laws because this is prevented by a dispute between the ruling camp and the president.
Therefore, Brussels’ decision also sparked criticism in the European Parliament, despite all the sympathy for Donald Tusk – we read further. Some MEPs fear that this will support Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who argues that the Commission is acting for political reasons and that the decision to suspend the payment of funds to his country is a punishment for his policies.
“Double measure”
The topic is also covered by the daily “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung”, whose commentator Nicolas Busse writes about a very generous loan of trust for Warsaw, but also about the use of double standards by the European Commission.
“In the dispute over the rule of law, it is releasing EUR 137 billion, although so far it has only received political assurances about the introduction of the desired reforms. Especially in the case of the justice system, there is only a small chance that the new beginning in Warsaw will be reflected in the Journal of Laws,” we read.
According to the newspaper’s commentator, the remaining EU members, who still have to give the green light to the payment of funds to Poland, should carefully consider whether they want to take part in this maneuver of the European Commission shortly before the European elections.
‘In the European Union, it has been argued for years that rule of law proceedings aim to objectively protect the EU budget and have nothing to do with partisan politics. But this is the impression created when a government friendly to the EU in Poland is measured by a different standard than its predecessors, which ‘Brussels’ fought against. Tusk’s coalition should have another incentive to formally restore the rule of law in Poland,” we read.
The European Commission announced on Thursday the release of EUR 6.3 billion for Poland from the pandemic recovery fund in the first tranche. In total, tens of billions more are still waiting to be paid. In recent years, Brussels has been blocking these funds, explaining, among other things, violating the principles of the rule of law and undermining EU law by the United Right governments in Poland.
The article comes from the website
Source: Gazeta
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