Polish communists fight political repression
A regional court in Poland sentenced four members of the Communist Party of Poland (CPP) to nine months of limited freedom, fines and unpaid labor doing ‘community service.’ The four were accused of “public promotion of fascism or any another totalitarian system of state” on March 31.
The prosecution of Polish communists is outrageous and reeks of political repression. According to the Polish government’s accusation, the Communist Party’s newspaper Brzask published articles “directly related with the communist system and Marxism-Leninism, which in the context of historical experience is contradictory with democratic values.” Allegations were thrown at the Party in 2011 and 2013 but the government’s lead prosecutor would not hear the case. It was only when the right-wing Law and Justice Party won recent elections did the new prosecutor general politicize the case and proceed with the charges.
Also, the CPP members were not given a regular trial. They had no opportunity to defend themselves. The court did not use a standard judgment procedure and based the court ruling on the charge alone. A Communist Party of Poland member, Bartosz Bieszczad, told Fight Back!, “The charge was not based on a lawyer’s assessment but an interpretation from an ‘expert’ from the Institute of National Memory.”
The sentencing comes just months before the NATO Summit is set to take place in Poland July 8-9. Bieszczad put the conviction in context as many inside Poland are critical of the government’s bowing down to every wish of the EU, NATO, and the U.S. “The EU tries to present or force a certain framework within which you can do politics and everything outside that framework is considered illegal,” stated Bieszczad
Bieszczad continued, “It is an attempt to eradicate and destroy completely the seeds of future change in our country.”
Protests condemning the political repression by the Polish government have taken place in front of Polish embassies in Belgrade, Serbia and Moscow, Russia.