Four Polish MEPs are potentially looking at up to three years in prison after the European Parliament stripped them of their immunity last week for liking and sharing posts on Facebook objecting to Islamic immigration.
The politicians, two of whom are from the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party and the others from the closely aligned Sovereign Poland (SP), are accused of spreading hate after sharing a video during the 2018 local elections warning about the emergence of “enclaves of Muslim refugees” in the country.
The MEPs in question are PiS’s Tomasz Piotr Poręba and Beata Mazurek, as well as SP’s Patryk Jaki and Beata Kempa. The move comes a month after Poland’s pro-EU opposition claimed victory in national elections.
Under EU law, MEPs maintain strict immunity from prosecution to prevent political intimidation. It can only be removed with the approval of the Parliament’s legal affairs committee, following a request from authorities in a member state.
This was just the latest swipe by Brussels at Warsaw’s governing conservatives. Last week, the EU parliament’s legal affairs committee had indeed recommended their immunity be lifted. The MEPs described the move as a politicised witch hunt influenced by Donald Tusk’s liberal Civil Platform party.
During this earlier committee stage, the Polish MEPs took particular umbrage at the use of the testimony of one highly controversial left-wing activist, Rafał Gaweł, who was forced to flee Poland after being convicted of financial embezzlement in 2020.
One French MEP in particular, Gilles Lebreton, broke ranks to describe the actions of the Parliament as inherently undemocratic and aimed at crippling the parliamentary activities of the four Polish MEPs.
Attacks against conservative Polish MEPs are common within the EU Parliament, but the European Commission is showing tentative signs of easing its vociferous rule of law harassment campaign against the Polish government following the election of a Europhile government in Warsaw.
While the new government is yet to take charge in Poland, it is expected to be led by former European Council President Donald Tusk along with centrist and left-wing factions, thus ending eight years of PiS rule.
