The police went to pick up the ministers from the time of the populist government from the presidential palace, where they were thought to have gone to avoid arrest.
in Poland Donald Hardly the new government’s efforts to correct the decisions of the previous populist government, which it considers undemocratic, have led to yet another conflict.
The police arrested the interior minister from the time of the populist government in the presidential palace on Tuesday by Mariusz Kamiński and Deputy Minister of the Interior Maciej Wąsik toowho have been convicted of abuse of power.
The former ministers are estimated to have applied to the palace to avoid arrest. President Andrzej Duda is close to their Law and Justice party.
Tusk accused President Duda of obstructing the administration of justice because he gave the men asylum.
Law and justice claim that former ministers are political prisoners. Kamiński says he started the hunger strike because he sees his sentence as political revenge.
Duda assures that he will work tirelessly to free Kamiński and Wąsik.
Tusk, who won the parliamentary elections in October, has announced that he will correct the anti-democratic decisions made by the national conservative Law and Justice during his eight-year government term. During the reign of the populists, Poland got into a dispute with the EU because, according to the Union, the country trampled on the principles of the rule of law.
Duda pardoned, the court overturned the amnesty
The case dates back to 2007, when the first government term of the Law and Justice party ended. The government had appointed an anti-corruption agency headed by Kamiński.
Kamiński, Wąsik and two others were charged with exceeding their authority in a corruption investigation and sentenced to three years in prison. They denied the charges and appealed the verdict.
When the Law and Justice party came back to power in 2015, President Duda pardoned Kamiński and the other convicts.
Last summer, however, the Supreme Court of Poland ruled that the amnesty was not legal because the appeals of the convicted had not yet been processed. In December, the court decided to keep original judgments valid. However, it reduced the prison term to two years. They are also not allowed to hold a public office for five years, when the ban was originally imposed for ten years.
On Monday, the court ordered Kamiński and Wąsik to be detained.
Kamiński and Wąsik were elected to the Sejm in the lower house of the Parliament in the October elections.
Sources: AP, AFP, Reuters, Uutiset