Status: 11/18/2021 9:46 a.m.
Poland’s government can now permanently prevent journalists, aid organizations and unwelcome observers from leaving the border: an urgent law was put in place.
The state of emergency in a strip along the 400-kilometer-long Polish-Belarusian border, which has already been extended once, cannot be extended again by law and will expire at the beginning of December. In the future, however, Interior Minister Mariusz Kaminski can again impose an entry ban in certain areas where he deems it right – this is what a law that was brought through the Sejm in an urgent procedure and now has to be discussed by the House of Lords, the Senate.
The regulation is not only directed against journalists, but also against non-governmental organizations, which at the beginning of the crisis documented unhindered how migrants wedged in the border forest clearly audibly expressed their desire for refugee protection without their application having been examined.
“Do not disturb border guards and police officers”
Maciej Wasik from the lead Ministry of the Interior explained in the Sejm: “It is a very important element through which people who call themselves NGOs do not attack our border from the west. We are aware that the media have to report, but they have to do it in one place do it in an orderly manner so that they do not disturb the Polish soldiers, border guards and police officers, “he said. “Polish media will come to the border, but in an orderly manner and just as the border guards dictate.”
In fact, the new law provides for exemption rules for journalists, which the competent border guard commander decides on.
Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki recently indicated that Poland wanted to set up a kind of press center to give journalists better access.
Opposition: “That is not acceptable”
The opposition believes the law is unconstitutional. She is also outraged that significant encroachments on fundamental freedoms are being pushed through in an urgent procedure with extremely short speaking and consultation times. Pawel Zalewski from the Oppsotion Party Polska 2050 demanded that their own media finally report what is happening at the Polish border: “We observe what is going on at the border from the perspective of the Belarusian KGB or with the help of foreign journalists from all over the world, who are on the Belarusian side, “he emphasizes. “That is not acceptable.”
Western journalists would reproduce Belarusian propaganda, PiS party leader Kaczynski had claimed in a radio interview: “This has various consequences and the result is an image that is exactly the opposite of what is happening in reality. That has to be combated quickly and decisively. “
Effects on assessment of the situation
Kaczynski’s supporters apparently see it similarly: In surveys, a large number of PiS sympathizers consider it right that journalists should be kept away – in contrast to the general mood in the country, according to which a majority wants access for journalists and humanitarian organizations. Inadequate information is also repeatedly criticized in Brussels, possibly with consequences for the joint assessment of the situation.
According to the PAP agency, there was an exchange of blows at EU ambassador level: While the representative of Germany stated that the situation at the border had eased after a phone call between Chancellor Angela Merkel and Alexander Lukashenko, his Polish counterpart is said to have vehemently contradicted: Von De-escalation is out of the question, on the contrary.