The delegation of the European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties on the Rule of Law completed a three-day visit to Poland on Wednesday 23 February, where it was able to investigate the problems related to the disciplinary chamber of the Supreme Court and, more broadly, the lack of judicial independence through meetings with members of the judiciary.
The delegation, led by Spain’s Juan Fernando Lopez Aguilar (S&D), Austria’s Othmar Karas (EPP) and Germany’s Gabriele Bischoff (S&D), heard testimonies from migrants, but also expressed concerns about the situation of women or LGBTIQ people and will report back to colleagues, said the German MEP.
The delegation also addressed the issue of media freedom with a view to setting up a Committee of Inquiry in the European Parliament to look into the use of the Pegasus spyware. For Othmar Karas, this visit was, in any case, an opportunity to send a strong message to both the Polish government and the Commission, with the MEP claiming that “not a single penny of the recovery funds” should be paid to Warsaw as long as the Court of Justice’s ruling on the disciplinary chamber has not been “fully implemented”.
While the Rule of law situation has “deteriorated” in the country, the Chair of the Committee on Civil Liberties also expressed “great concern about the lack of transparency regarding the situation on the border with Belarus, where political representatives, journalists and NGOs are denied access”.
“We also call on the EU Council to go beyond just holding hearings on the Article 7 procedure and take appropriate action”, Gabriele Bischoff also commented.
The delegation, composed of six other MEPs, also wanted to meet members of the ruling PiS party, but this was “not possible”, which is “not a good signal”, said Othmar Karas. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)