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Members of Donald Tusk’s coalition government have expressed concerns over the
plans. Photograph: Tomasz Waszczuk/EPA
View image in fullscreen
Members of Donald Tusk’s coalition government have expressed concerns over the
plans. Photograph: Tomasz Waszczuk/EPA
Poland



HUMAN RIGHTS GROUPS URGE POLISH PM TO SHELVE PLAN TO SUSPEND RIGHT TO ASYLUM

More than 60 NGOs including Holocaust memorial group tell Donald Tusk region’s
volatility ‘doesn’t exempt us from humanity’


Ashifa Kassam
Tue 15 Oct 2024 06.00 CESTLast modified on Tue 15 Oct 2024 11.24 CEST
Share




Human rights organisations and a Holocaust memorial group have urged the Polish
prime minister to shelve plans to temporarily suspend the right to asylum,
telling him that the region’s volatility “doesn’t exempt us from humanity”.

The intervention from more than 60 NGOs including Amnesty International and the
Auschwitz-Birkenau Foundation comes after Donald Tusk told his party of plans to
introduce a new migration strategy.



It would include “the temporary territorial suspension of the right to asylum”,
he said. “I will demand this, I will demand recognition in Europe for this
decision.”

In an open letter, the coalition of NGOs criticised the comments, saying that
fundamental rights and freedoms were not fodder for discussion or political
bargaining. “It is thanks to them that thousands of Polish women and men found
shelter abroad in the difficult times of communist totalitarianism,” it read.

“We live in difficult and uncertain times of war, conflicts breaking out all
over the world, and we ourselves function on the edge of a war,” it added. “But
this doesn’t exempt us from humanity and from observing the law.”

Since 2021, Warsaw and the EU have accused Belarus and Russia of encouraging
migrants and refugees, most of them from the Middle East and Africa, to travel
to Minsk and onwards to the Polish border.

The migratory route was seized on by politicians hoping to score political
points, leading rights groups to warn of pushbacks and violence against those
seeking a better life. Hundreds of people have gone missing, while dozens of
deaths have been documented.

As Poland gears up for presidential elections expected in May, Tusk on Saturday
hinted that his campaign would focus on migration as he vowed to reduce
irregular migration to “a minimum” and “regain 100% of the control over who
enters and leaves Poland”.

He did not offer further details on how he planned to temporarily suspend asylum
or explain how he would skirt international laws that oblige countries to offer
the right of asylum to people seeking protection.

Members of Tusk’s coalition government expressed concern over the move. The
parliament speaker, Szymon Hołownia, whose centre-right Poland 2050 party is
part of Tusk’s ruling coalition, stressed that Tusk had been speaking only for
his own party.

“We are of the opinion that the right to asylum is ‘sacred’ in international
law,” Hołownia said on social media. Krzysztof Śmiszek of the Left, another
coalition member, pointed to the importance that respect for the law had played
in guiding the country during the previous rightwing government of the Law and
Justice (PiS) party.

“The rule of law also means respect for international law,” Śmiszek wrote on
social media. “It showed us the way during the dark rule of PiS. Let’s not stray
from this path.”

While the EU declined to comment on the specific plans, a spokesperson for the
European commission said it was in touch with Polish authorities to find out
more details. She acknowledged the need to work towards a European solution
capable of tackling “hybrid attacks” from Russia and Belarus, but noted that
“member states have international and EU obligations, including the obligation
to provide access to the asylum procedure.”

On Monday, Tusk defended his plans. “It is our right and our duty to protect the
Polish and European border,” he wrote on social media. “Its security will not be
negotiated.”

Tusk’s plans come months after Finland adopted a new law that granted border
guards power to push back asylum seekers crossing from Russia.

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It appears that Tusk is hoping to bolster political support before the election
by targeting migration, said Małgorzata Szuleka of Poland’s oldest human rights
organisation, the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights.

“It’s so disappointing to see this coming from this government, who made so many
promises for increased cooperation and policymaking with civil society,” she
said. “When it comes to the question of migration, we were supposed to have
policy but all we have is politics.”

She described the plans as unworkable. “It goes without saying that it is
legally impossible to suspend the right to asylum,” she said, citing
international law, EU law and the Polish constitution. “I read this statement
purely for the purpose of national politics. It is extremely populistic.”

Poland is only the latest EU member state seeking flexibility and/or the
tightening up of EU asylum rules in the run-up to a European summit on Thursday
that is likely to be dominated by the issue of irregular migration.

The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, wrote to EU leaders on
Monday, calling for exploration of “return hubs” outside the EU, as well as
learning lessons from Italy’s agreement with Albania – an EU candidate country
that has agreed to host migration centres to process claims of male asylum
seekers seeking to enter the union.

Some EU leaders have previously criticised schemes for external processing of
asylum seekers, such as the previous UK government’s deal with Rwanda, but there
is now growing appetite in the EU for similar approaches. Germany, once a
relatively liberal voice on asylum on migration, has become more hawkish and is
thought unlikely to block such initiatives.

In her letter, von der Leyen also praised the EU’s controversial deals with
Tunisia and joint work with Libyan authorities, which have been widely condemned
by human rights groups. She said irregular arrivals on the central Mediterranean
route were down two-thirds in 2024 so far, which she attributed largely to these
agreements.

Additional reporting by Jennifer Rankin in Brussels

Explore more on these topics
 * Poland
 * Migration
 * Refugees
 * Europe
 * Donald Tusk
 * Human rights
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