The ‘Polish issue’ short-circuits the EU

By Costas Raptis

The European Union has always been considered the field of difficult but imaginative compromises. Only in the conflict that has erupted between Poland and Brussels, on the occasion of the decision of the Polish Constitutional Court on the primacy of national over Community law, the political solution has now been ruled out. Following an appeal by the Commission, the European Court of Justice imposed a fine of one million euros per day on 27 October for Warsaw ‘refusal to comply with previous interim measures by the same court which ruled that Polish law was incompatible with European rule of law. disciplinary control by the executive. The Polish side lost its request for revocation to the European Court of Justice itself against the imposition of a fine.

The result is the unification of Poland’s ruling parties, which are deprived of the possibility of a happy retreat (after all, the most Eurosceptic of them is held by the Ministry of Justice) and the case is turned into a “zero-sum game”.

The unpaid fines are accumulating and the Community authorities will sooner or later have to reclaim them by committing the amount of disbursements to which Poland is entitled under a Community budget. In a more extreme scenario, what Warsaw has received from the post-pandemic recovery fund could also be at stake, namely € 24 billion in grants and another € 12 billion in loans. It is no coincidence that the approval by the Commission of the Polish plan for the allocation of these amounts is still pending.

But it would be reckless to assume that Warsaw is left unarmed and is merely destined to capitulate.

The messages are already multiplying that the nationalist government of Poland will resort to its veto, in any community body this is still applicable, while the relations within the Visegrad group with the equally “unruly” Hungary of Victor Orbγγn are objectively close. The European capitals can only place their hopes on the (anything but guaranteed) defeat of the ruling parties of these two countries in the next parliamentary elections scheduled for 2022 and 2023, respectively.

“Political blackmail”

And the “fronts” on which the awkward Eastern Europeans “hold” their other partners are constantly multiplying.

Quite characteristically, Polish Prime Minister Matthew Morawiecki warned that any cut in European funding to his country could jeopardize the achievement of the EU’s climate targets.

Speaking to Polish media on the sidelines of the UN Climate Conference in Glasgow, Morawiecki warned that “in order for Poland to participate in a way comparable to other countries in achieving ambitious climate goals, it must be given the appropriate funds.” “for its energy transformation. On the contrary, he added, it would mean that “political blackmail from Brussels prevails over the achievement of climate goals”. It is noted that Poland is a leading producer of coal, on which it relies about 70% of its energy supply.

Crisis on the border with Belarus

But as if that were not enough, Poland has recently (along with neighboring Lithuania) become the scene of an unpredictable security crisis. With the help of Russia, he has secured his stay in power despite Western opposition to his re-election in the last election. facilitating the opening of a new refugee flow route with Afghans airlifted from Kabul to Minsk and abandoned at the border, where the Polish and Lithuanian authorities keep them trapped in dead life under unacceptable humanitarian conditions. Ten of them have already lost their lives.

In fact, it was only on Wednesday that Poland accused Belarus of organizing an armed cross-border invasion and summoned (for the third time in a row recently) the Belarusian ambassador to explain an incident that he considers to be a deliberate escalation of the two countries’ immigration crisis.

In particular, the Polish Foreign Ministry reported that on the night of November 1. Unidentified gunmen crossed from Belarus into Polish territory at a depth of 300 meters, before retreating, after first loading their weapons, after the appearance of Polish border guards.

The Commission and Warsaw consider that migration flows are being promoted from Belarus to the neighboring country, as a form of hybrid war in order to put pressure on the EU. and lift the sanctions imposed on Minsk.

Second thoughts

It is in this context that the most Atlantic-oriented political forces are beginning to treat the Brussels-Warsaw vendetta that has been in place since last spring as an unnecessary luxury. Thus, the German MEP of the Greens, Reinhard Buttigofer, warned the EU. not to have such a confrontational stance and to acknowledge that Poland has legitimate objections, in particular to the way in which the Franco-German duo has exercised its hegemony, ignoring Polish interests in cases such as the construction of the German-Russian submarine pipeline Stream 2 or the attempt of Emanuel Macron and Angela Merkel to invite Vladimir Putin to a European Summit.

How long will the average Pole remain a Europeanist?

Could all this lead to a “Polish exit” (Polexit) from the EU? It certainly looks like a political fantasy scenario, given the overwhelming support of the European street in all polls of the Polish population. But just as imaginative would look e.g. and a British exit in 2015. The turn that could take a full-blown confrontation with Poland so committed to its sovereignty and its peculiar conception of national greatness is completely unpredictable, especially if inelastic views prevail that will cause erroneous tactics. The British precedent, after all, made the “unthinkable” possible. And yet the European sentiments of the average Pole are largely linked to EU recruitment. as a source of funds – so they may be shaken if this fact is overturned.