Thorbjørn Jagland, the Secretary General of the Council of Europe (CoE), Gianni Buquicchio, president of the Venice Commission and Nils Muiznieks, Human Rights Commissioner of the CoE, on Tuesday 18 July jointly expressed their grave concerns at the reforms of the legal system adopted on 12 July by the Polish parliament (Sejm) to modify the functioning of the Supreme Court and the National Court Register of Poland.
In a letter to Marek Kuchcinski, Speaker of the Sejm, Jagland stressed the “crucial role” of supreme courts in democracies. Reiterating the requirement for caution in the event of legislative amendments affecting the independent functioning of the courts, he called on the Sejm to “uphold the Council of Europe standards and not to proceed hastily”.
Referring to the European Human Rights Convention and the case-law of the Court of the same name, Buquicchio laid emphasis on the importance of the independence of the judiciary in a constitutional state. The Venice Commission of the CoE, which is made up of independent constitutional law experts, has not yet formally examined the amendments recently adopted, but its president is already stressing that any legislation that arbitrarily puts an end to the judges' office cannot be considered as anything other than flagrant breach of the European constitutional heritage.
Muiznieks, for his part, published a detailed article on Monday 17 July on openDemocracy.net developing the condemnation of the reforms already voiced on Twitter the day after the vote of the Polish parliament (see EUROPE 11829). In his conclusions, he spoke out against any intervention of the executive or legislative powers in the judiciary, recommends that at least half the members of the Polish National Court Register be peer-selected, calls for the Supreme Court judges to have security of tenure, notwithstanding any serious violation of the disciplinary or penal provisions and that examining any such must be the responsibility of an independent authority or court, with no interference from the political level and in line with the principles of a fair trial.
He stressed that these principles alone will allow independent judges to protect the citizens from the arbitrary use of governmental powers. (Original version in French by Véronique Leblanc)