In an interview with CNA, Polish Member of Parliament Ryszard Legutko, from the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party, claimed that while for countries like France or Germany, the rule of law report relied on official documents from state institutions, it was based on “opinions from political opponents and hostile NGOs” when it came to Poland.
He called into question the very legitimacy of this annual report, stating that the European Commission “is not a super-government or some super-court to judge the member states’ legal systems, especially since those are within the sole competencies of the member states.”
“With the Commission blocking Poland’s post-Covid recovery plan, it has become clear that Ursula von der Leyen [the commission’s president] and her colleagues want to topple the Polish government,” he commented, denouncing a “more and more politically aggressive” institution.
“The worst violator of the rule of law in Europe is the EU itself, as it persistently sidesteps all limitations that the treaties imposed on it, particularly article 5 of the Treaty on European Union (TEU), which stipulates the principles of conferral, subsidiarity, and proportionality,” he said.
The same criticism was leveled last year by Polish religious leaders and Catholic lawyers against the European Parliament following its adoption of a resolution to condemn the ban on eugenic abortion in Poland. In this resolution, the Parliament asked the European Commission to trigger the rule of law mechanism and suspend funds to Poland until the country modifies its constitution to liberalize abortion.
According to MEP Legutko, the conservative essence of the Polish and Hungarian governments and their refusal to join “the EU mainstream” motivates many of the accusations against them. “When Slovenia had a conservative government, it was also attacked,” he pointed out.
The parliamentarian added that the leaders of these institutions mainly targeted the Christian foundations of these conservative governments.
“Despite the weakening of Christianity in Europe, hostility towards the Christian religion is growing among the European institutions; there is nothing paradoxical about it,” he said. “Christianity is still perceived as a force that resists the moral revolution conducted by the Left, like abortion, same-sex marriage, gender ideology, green revolution, etc.”
“The European People’s Party [a transnational organization gathering Christian-democratic, conservative, and liberal-conservative member parties, and that represents today the largest political party in the European Parliament and Commission] has long capitulated and accepted the left-wing agenda and ideologies,” Legutko continued.
“Christian democracy, in fact, has disappeared from European politics. It is therefore quite understandable that countries like Poland, which still has a strong Catholic culture and community, and resists the current moral revolution, are met with aggressive reactions from the EU,” he concluded. “And this aggression will increase until or unless Poland capitulates. I hope it won’t.”
Solène Tadié is the Europe Correspondent for the National Catholic Register. She is French-Swiss and grew up in Paris. After graduating from Roma III University with a degree in journalism, she began reporting on Rome and the Vatican for Aleteia. She joined L’Osservatore Romano in 2015, where she successively worked for the French section and the Cultural pages of the Italian daily newspaper. She has also collaborated with several French-speaking Catholic media organizations. Solène has a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas.