‘Blackmail & nasty threats’ Poland's war with EU rages on as new PM takes swipe at bloc
POLAND’S incoming prime minister has fired a warning shot to the European Union after accusing the bloc of making “nasty threats”.
Mateusz Morawiecki, 49, a Western-educated finance minister, accused the leaders of the European Union of making “nasty threats” but said Poland would stand tall against the bloc’s “blackmail”.
Speaking in reference to the possible loss of the EU cohesion funds – which could be withdrawn as a punishment for Warsaw’s alleged abuse of the rule of law – he said: “These are nasty threats. Poland is a proud and great nation and we will not allow this sort of a blackmail.”
Poland and the European Commission have been embroiled in a long-running spat over changes made by the ruling Law and Justice party (PiS) to the media and the judiciary.
The Venice Commission, a democracy watchdog for the Council of Europe human rights group, said in a statement on Friday, the effect of the reforms “puts at serious risk the independence of all parts of the Polish judiciary”.
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Brussels also took Poland - along with Hungary and the Czech Republic - to the European Court of Justice over their refusal to take in asylum seekers.
Mr Morawiecki said he also recalled former French president Francois Hollande saying “you have values, we have funds”.
Mr Morawiecki said: “I do remember one former president telling us earlier this year, ‘you have values, we have funds’.
“Well, I would love to help the West with proper values."
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Mr Morawiecki added: “What is most important for me is that the Lord gives me enough strength to serve Poland.
“We are a part of the European Union but we want to transform it, to re-Christianise it. This is my dream.”
He added: “We are building Poland as a strong, efficient state, but also a state that incorporates universal and Christian values.
“We will defend them, as well as our uniqueness, against the background — unfortunately, we must say — of laicisation [defrocking of the clergy] and falling into deeper consumerism, lack of principles, lack of values which is a prevailing feature now in Western Europe.”
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He said: “What is most important for me is that the Lord gives me enough strength to serve Poland.”
In other comments likely to set alarm bells ringing in the corridors of Brussels, he said he planned to keep the government “almost identical” to that of outgoing prime minister Beata Szydło.
Poland, along with other east European countries have proved to be a thorn in the side of the EU with Poland and others resisting moves by the bloc for further integration.
The prerecorded interview with Telewizja Trwam was aired on Friday, just two hours after Mr Morawiecki had been officially nominated as Prime Minister by President Andrzej Duda.
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Mr Morawiecki said his government would continue the generous social agenda of the outgoing Cabinet but added that he wanted “to do even more work internationally in order to peel off these very unjust labels that some people try to stick on us.”
In a part of the interview that was not aired but reported on the Radio Maryja portal, according to Politico, he said any suggestions that PiS wanted to lead Poland out of the EU were “completely untrue and such allegations are absurd.”
When asked if he planned to move ahead with Poland adopting the euro, he replied: “We certainly are not in a hurry to join the eurozone as it is experiencing problems now and has many limitations. We should stay with the national currency.”
