Tag: European Commission

Joint submission of the civil society coalition regarding the Proposal for a REGULATION OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purposes of money laundering and terrorist financing Can the EU’s anti-money laundering reform help dictators? As the European Union gets closer to adopting […]

On 4 March 2021 we organised an online hearing for Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), European Parliament advisors and selected journalists under the title “Law and Justice’s Crackdown on Independent Prosecutors in Poland Intensifies”, featuring persecuted Polish independent prosecutors from the Lex Super Omnia association – Katarzyna Kwiatkowska, Jacek Bilewicz and Ewa Wrzosek – […]

In the latest instance of the Polish authorities’ open disregard for the rule of law, 14 Cracow judges have been exposed to politicised prosecution and investigations. Their alleged crime? Handing down judgments which were inconvenient for the authorities and failing to persecute Prosecutor Krasoń – a staunch defender of the independence of the judiciary.  This […]

The Ordo Iuris Institute is a fundamentalist organisation, highly active in Poland and the EU. It is linked – according to numerous sources – to both the Kremlin and a dangerous Brasilian sect. They are directly responsible for numerous assaults on EU values, most notably human rights and equality, successfully campaigning i.a. against LGBTI rights (being the architects of the “LGBT-free zones” in Poland), for the EU not to ratify the Council of Europe’s “Convention on combating violence against women and domestic violence” (Instanbul Convention) and most notably against the fundamental rights of women. They are behind the recent, barbaric, total abortion ban in Poland, which led to the largest protests the country has seen since the fall of communism.

Today, on June 9, 2020, the Disciplinary Chamber of the Supreme Court is holding a closed hearing regarding lifting the immunity of judge Igor Tuleya. This and other glaring violations of ECJ judgements and EU law have compelled the world’s leading legal scholars to sign a follow-up letter by ODF and Prof. Laurent Pech to the European Commission regarding the deterioration of the rule of law in Poland.

The Open Dialogue Foundation provided inputs to the first annual Rule of Law Report, the European Commission’s latest oversight mechanism and a part of its wider rule of law toolbox. Together with experts and practitioners from Poland – judges Dariusz Mazur and Agnieszka Niklas-Bibik, as well as former public media employee, Piotr Owczarski – we submitted our feedback on the worrisome developments in the Polish justice system and media sector in 2019 and the first half of 2020. The European Commission’s initiative will result in the “Rule of Law Report”, expected to be published in September 2020.

The next few days and weeks will determine the fate of the Supreme Court, a key institution in the Polish legal system that is currently upholding the independence of the judiciary. In 2018 the Supreme Court was attacked by two foreign bodies, the so-called Disciplinary Chamber (ID) and the Chamber of Extraordinary Control and Public Affairs (IKNiSP). Contrary to their names, they do not consist of independent judges, but of party nominees loyal to the current parliamentary majority and the Law and Justice government.

The Open Dialogue Foundation is one of eight European organisations whose comments and report on the state of the judiciary in EU Member States in the framework of the EU Justice Scoreboard 2020 initiative have been adopted and published by the European Commission. Our study was prepared together with the ‘Themis’ Association of Judges and concerned the state of the Polish justice system.

In light of the ongoing assault on the independence of the judiciary in Poland by the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party – and especially the recently-exposed hate campaign against judges and prosecutors, orchestrated by the justice ministry itself – the Renew Europe group and the Open Dialogue Foundation have organised on December 12th, 2019, a European Parliament lunch debate with prosecutors and judges persecuted in Poland.

Non-governmental organisations (including the Open Dialogue Foundation) and academics specialising in issues related to the rule of law and the protection of human rights, sent an open letter to the President of the European Commission, in which they call for immediate steps to stop the rapidly growing legal chaos in Poland, including prompt submission in the European Court of Justice, of an application for interim measures in Case C-791/19 Commission v Poland, pending before the Court of Justice. The full content of the letter is presented below.

ODF is proud to have organised a high-level mission to Brussels of the most famous “disobedient” Polish judges & prosecutors – the leading victims of the systemic persecution & defamation of the independent judiciary in the country: judges Waldemar Żurek & Dariusz Mazur and prosecutors Krzysztof Parchimowicz & Ewa Wrzosek.

The Open Dialog Foundation (ODF) received a letter from the office of Mr. Frans Timmermans, First Vice-President of the European Commission, providing responses and explanations regarding the two Polish MEPs’ questioning of the legitimacy of ODF’s registration on the Transparency Register

“Just as in 1980 there could not be freedom without solidarity, today there can not be freedom without the rule of law!” – former President Lech Wałęsa appeals to the European Commission regarding the reform of the Supreme Court in Poland, which will come into force on 3 July 2018.

On 20 June, 2017, Council of the European Union, European Parliament and the European Commission, agreed on the €100 million macro-financial assistance to the Republic of Moldova, linking it with the strict conditions on fight against corruption and money laundering.

“I’m speaking about this issue because I know that from every side, Russian propaganda is using every opportunity to attack the EU institutions and I think it’s crucial for human rights defenders, for everyone present in this room, to know that it is really important and we value your work”.