A former Law and Justice (PiS) MP and Constitutional Tribunal judge, as well as a current PiS MP, have been ordered to apologise to Lyudmyla Kozlovska, President of the Open Dialogue Foundation (ODF), for a series of “false statements” they disseminated about her and the organisation she leads. This took place during the PiS government’s time in office, mainly through media outlets under its control. Both judgments were delivered by the court of first instance.
Szynkowski vel Sęk Must Apologise
On 24 March, the 4th Civil Division of the Regional Court in Warsaw delivered its judgment in the personal rights case brought by Lyudmyla Kozlovska and Bartosz Kramek, the couple leading the Open Dialogue Foundation, against Law and Justice (PiS) MP Szymon Szynkowski vel Sęk. The parliamentarian lost the case at first instance. The court ruled against him and ordered him to publish statements of apology within seven days of the judgment becoming final.
In those statements, the MP is required to apologise to Kozlovska and the Foundation “for infringing their personal rights and damaging their reputation”. The apologies concern numerous statements made by the MP. According to the judgment, Szynkowski vel Sęk disseminated “false information”, including regarding the alleged threat posed by Germany’s and Belgium’s decision to grant visas to Kozlovska, the Foundation’s alleged acceptance of money “from shell companies in exchange for lobbying”, its alleged “Russian connections and hybrid activities”, and the organisation’s supposedly “non-transparent financing”.
The judgment specifies the places where Szynkowski vel Sęk disseminated these fake news stories:
- X (formerly Twitter),
- vod.tvp.pl,
- Polskie Radio 24,
- telewizjarepublika.pl,
- as well as during a meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on European Union Affairs.
In accordance with the judgment, the MP must publish appropriate apologies in each of the above-mentioned media outlets for a period of 30 days, with slightly different wording adapted to each medium. He must also deliver the apology at the first meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on European Union Affairs following the judgment becoming final. Each statement must include information that it is being published “as a result of a lost court case.” In addition to the wording of the apologies, the judgment specifies in detail the form in which they are to be published.
The court dismissed Kozlovska’s claim for PLN 20,000 in compensation. We contacted the MP by email requesting a comment and asking whether he had appealed, or intended to appeal, the judgment. We received no response.
Krystyna Pawłowicz Also Loses Her Case
Eleven days earlier, another personal rights case, also before the Regional Court in Warsaw and also brought by the Open Dialogue Foundation and Lyudmyla Kozlovska, was lost by another former PiS MP, later a judge of the Constitutional Tribunal – Krystyna Pawłowicz.
The apology that the former PiS MP is required to publish once the judgment becomes final states that she disseminated “harmful and false information” on her account on what is now the X platform (then Twitter).
“I acknowledge that my publications contained unreliable and false information, factually unsupported suggestions and insinuations, particularly with regard to the activities and connections of Ms Lyudmyla Kozlovska, thereby portraying her in a negative light.”
This is the wording of the apology ordered by the court.
Pawłowicz is required to sign the statement personally and, after scanning it, publish it on her X profile as a pinned post for seven days. She must also sign the apology and send it to Kozlovska in hard copy.
What exactly did Krystyna Pawłowicz write?
On 13 September 2018, she published the following post on her X account:
“By violating the ALERT decision of their official ally, Poland, to expel Lyudmyla Kozlovska from Poland and the EU, and by inviting her as their guest despite that decision, Germany merely confirmed its anti-Polish alliance with Russia and the legitimacy of expelling from Poland a person so important to Russia.”
The day before, she wrote:
“And, in general, BY WHAT RIGHT are the Germans holding ‘hearings on the rule of law IN POLAND’ in their Bundestag!? And is the supposedly reliable source of information on ‘fascism’, ‘dictatorship’ and the ‘violation of freedoms’ in Poland to be Kozlovska, a Ukrainian commonly regarded as Putin’s agent?” (original spelling and punctuation preserved).
Yesterday, we found no pinned statement of apology on her account, as required by the judgment. We contacted Krystyna Pawłowicz by email, through the secretariats of both the Constitutional Tribunal and the Law and Justice party, requesting a comment on the judgment and asking whether she intended to appeal or had already done so. We received no response.
On behalf of the Open Dialogue Foundation, both cases were commented on by Marcin Mycielski, the organisation’s Vice President.
“For years, PiS politicians tried to destroy us with lies, smear campaigns and propaganda. Today, once again, the court is telling them: enough. (…) When the state was in PiS’s hands, they behaved as though they could spread any slander with complete impunity. This judgment shows that they could not,” writes Mycielski.
He stresses that the judgment is also important for other civil society organisations, activists and critics of those in power whom PiS sought to break through “smear campaigns.”
“The essence of this case is simple: if politicians can, with impunity, label their opponents as ‘Russian agents’, democracy comes to an end and political gangsterism begins,” he concludes.
Twenty Lawsuits Filed
These are yet more court victories for the Open Dialogue Foundation and its leadership, Lyudmyla Kozlovska and Bartosz Kramek. During the parliamentary work on legislation politicising the judiciary in mid-2017, Kramek published his widely discussed appeal for civil disobedience in Gazeta Wyborcza: “Let the State Stop: Let’s Shut Down the Government!” As a result, the ruling PiS government began a campaign of harassment against activists with whom it had cooperated until shortly before.
The Open Dialogue Foundation underwent numerous inspections. In 2018, services subordinate to the PiS government expelled Lyudmyla Kozlovska from Poland and also sought to have her removed from the European Union. As is now known, following a series of court cases won by the activist, those actions by the PiS-controlled services proved to have been unfounded. At the same time, media outlets controlled by the then governing camp launched a smear campaign against the Open Dialogue Foundation, Kozlovska and Kramek.
In October 2019, the Foundation struck back by filing 20 civil lawsuits against PiS politicians and propagandists who had publicly accused them of alleged ties to Putin’s Russia, money laundering, acting as foreign agents, working against Poland’s national interest, and similar allegations.
To date, the Open Dialogue Foundation and its leadership have won 11 personal rights cases, including those against:
- Maciej Wąsik
- Dominik Tarczyński
- Joachim Brudziński
- Patryk Jaki
- Witold Waszczykowski
- Tomasz Sakiewicz (twice)
- Telewizja Polska (TVP)
- Polskie Radio
Some of these judgments — for example, the one in the case against Maciej Wąsik — have already become final.
“A bailiff, acting on our behalf, seized money from his first salary as a Member of the European Parliament,” Mycielski recalls.
As a result of the judgments, Polskie Radio and TVP have each been ordered to pay PLN 200,000 in compensation for the harm caused by the “smear campaign” they conducted during the PiS era.
Judgments are still pending in cases brought by the Open Dialogue Foundation against, among others, Witold Gadowski, Fratria (the publisher of, among others, wPolityce.pl), Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, Ryszard Czarnecki, and others.
The Open Dialogue Foundation works to defend human rights and the rule of law, primarily in the countries of the former socialist bloc and the former Soviet republics. For more than a decade, it has also been providing humanitarian assistance to Ukraine. Most recently, it co-organised the major fundraising campaign “Warmth from Poland for Kyiv”, which raised funds for generators.
Source: goniec.pl
In other media:
