US-owned broadcaster says it faces intimidation from Poland

[JustJohn or JJ]

US-owned broadcaster says it faces intimidation from Poland

By VANESSA GERA2 hours ago

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — A U.S.-owned broadcaster said it was the target of attempted intimidation by Polish authorities, describing how security agents appeared at the home of a cameraman who went undercover to film neo-Nazis and told him he must appear for questioning on suspicion of propagating fascism.

TVN, owned by Discovery, broadcast undercover footage in January that showed members of a Polish neo-Nazi group celebrating Adolf Hitler’s birthday in a forest in 2017.

It said that on Friday evening, agents with Poland’s Internal Security Agency visited the home of the cameraman who had gone undercover, Piotr Wacowski, and gave him the summons to appear in the investigation.

TVN said Saturday that its journalists have “acted in accordance with all standards of investigative journalism” and that it considers the state action “an attempt to intimidate journalists.”

The move against Wacowski comes amid rising concerns about the state of media freedom in Poland, where the populist ruling party has turned tax-funded public media into a propaganda tool and is looking for a way to limit foreign ownership of media companies. TVN has been critical of the government and is seen as particularly vulnerable.

The ruling party, Law and Justice, has faced international condemnation for a string of moves seen as un-democratic — from a Holocaust speech law passed this year seen as an attack on freedom of speech and academic inquiry, to attempts to take control of the courts.

The party has also been making conciliatory moves toward extremist rightwing groups. On the Nov. 11 Independence Day holiday, top officials marched in Warsaw with far-right groups. Government officials have also publicly attacked independent monitors of xenophobia who have noted a rise of hate speech over the past year.

Rafal Pankowski, the head of the Never Again association, which monitors extremism, expressed his concerns about the investigation into the reporter.

“It’s an example of a breakdown in democratic standards. On November 11, the highest level officials marched together with rightwing extremists in Warsaw, now state institutions harass a journalist involved in exposing the problem of rightwing extremism,” Pankowski told The Associated Press on Sunday. “It’s a clear case of shooting the messenger and really worrying.”

TVN was bought for $2 billion by the U.S. company Scripps Networks Interactive, making it the largest U.S. investment ever in Poland. Scripps has since been bought by Discovery, Inc., which is based in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Last year, Poland’s media regulator slapped TVN with a fine of nearly 1.5 million zlotys ($395,000 at today’s exchange rate) for what it alleged to biased overage of anti-government protests, a move some saw as an attack on media freedom. The regulator called it a “warning” to commercial TV stations, though in the end the fine was rescinded.

The U.S. Ambassador to Poland, Georgette Mosbacher, warned Polish authorities last week that any attempt to restrict media freedom would harm the U.S.-Polish relationship.

[pieter]

John,

I heard older Poles saying that the climate in present day Poland reminded them of the days of the Polish peoples republic with the Stalinist Polish communist secret police Urząd Bezpieczeństwa (from 1945 to 1954) and after that the Służba Bezpieczeństwa ('Security Service') from 1956 until the end of the People's Republic in 1989. Lack of press freedom and freedom of speech due to the hinderance of the state security police or secret service. The present regime will have studied the practices of the Urząd Bezpieczeństwa and Służba Bezpieczeństwa. In the same time the present regime will have studied other nations, the tactics and strategies of the Hungarian, Russian, German, American and possibly the Israeli authorities.

I do believe that there is a difference between the rightwing conservative national populist government of Poland on one side and the extreme-right Neo-Nazi, Neo-Fascist National Radical Camp (Polish: Obóz Narodowo-Radykalny, ONR) and the Falanga National Radical Camp (RNR-Falanga or ONR-Falanga) on the other side. The Polish regime is not fascist nor Falangist ( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falangism ), because it's leaders come from the democratic Solidarność dissident opposition towards communism.

Law and Justice (Prawo i Sprawiedliwość) is a party which is rightwing National conservative, Polish nationalist party with Polish Patriotic, Right-wing populist, Economic nationalist (like Steve Bannon, Geert Wilders, Marine Le Pen, Donald Trump, Nigel Farage, Victor Orban, Vladimir Putin and Benjamin Netanyahu), Social conservative, Christian democratic (the rightwing conservative wing of the European Christian Democracy, close to the Austrian People's Party [German: Österreichische Volkspartei; ÖVP] and the Bavarian CSU, Alternative für Deutschland, Soft Eurosceptic and Populist elements.

Nationalism



Despite being labeled by many former Western Bloc States as a "nationalist" party, PiS' leadership constantly criticizes being offered such label. During the 2008 Polish Independence Day celebrations, Lech Kaczyński said in his speech during the visit to the city of Elbląg that "the state is a great value, and attachment to the state, to one's fatherland, we call patriotism - beware of the word nationalism, as nationalism is evil!" On the same day during the celebrations in Warsaw, L. Kaczyński again stated: "patriotism doesn't equal nationalism." In 2011, Jarosław Kaczyński criticized pre-war Polish nationalism for "its intellectual, political and moral failure" by emphasising that the movement "did not know how to deal with and solve the problems of Polish minorities." Both Kaczyńskis twins look up for inspirations to the pre-war Sanacja movement with its leader Józef Piłsudski, in contrast to the nationalist Endecja that was led by Piłsudski's political archrival, Roman Dmowski. In February 2016, politician Paweł Kowal called Jarosław Kaczyński a "centre-right politician" who "just like Piłsudski before the war, he stopped the raise of nationalism in Poland at the time when such ideology clearly gains politically in Western Europe." Polish far-right organizations and parties such as National Revival of Poland, National Movement and Autonomous Nationalists regularly criticize PiS' relative ideological moderation and its politicians for "monopolizing" official political scene by playing on the popular patriotic and religious feelings.


Polish nationalist woman during a far right demonstration

Refugee/economic migrant policies


Children at the Targowek refugee center outside Warsaw (Photo: Helene Bienvenu)

PiS opposed mass relocation of refugees/economic migrants from the Middle East and North Africa to Poland during the European migrant crisis.

Some PiS politicians have also made anti-migration and anti-Islam comments when discussing the European migrant crisis; in 2015, Jarosław Kaczyński stated that Poland "can't" accept any refugees because "they could spread infectious diseases." In 2017, the first Deputy Minister of Justice Patryk Jaki stated that "stopping Islamization is his Westerplatte". In 2017, Interior minister of Poland Mariusz Błaszczak stated that he would like to be like "Charles the Hammer who stopped the Muslim invasion of Europe in VIII century". In 2017, vice-marshal of the Sejm Joachim Brudziński stated during the pro-party rally in Siedlce; "if not for us (PiS), they (Muslims) would have built mosques in here (Poland)."

Cheers,
Pieter

[Jaga]

John,

it is hard for me to believe that there is really any significant following for Neo-Nazi saluting Hitler in Poland. Hitler was never popular in Poland neither among left of right-wing nationalists. Maybe you can find 1-2 crazy people in Poland saluting Hitler.... so this definitively should not symbolize Poland. I agree with Pieter