Polish wiretapping affair (2014)

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Prime Minister Donald Tusk and National Bank Chairman Marek Belka
Polish Interior Minister Bartłomiej Sienkiewicz

The Polish wiretapping affair of 2014 ( Polish: Afera taśmowa or Afera podsłuchowa ) involves the successive publication of recordings of intercepted conversations by the Polish news magazine Wprost . Members of the government under Prime Minister Donald Tusk , important officials and entrepreneurs are said to have been wiretapped over a long period of time. The affair that dragged on into the following year damaged the reputation of the governing coalition, which lost both the presidential and parliamentary elections in 2015 .

course

June 2014

On June 16, 2014, the news magazine Wprost began successively publishing recordings of intercepted conversations between members of the government under Prime Minister Donald Tusk , important officials and entrepreneurs. The conversations, allegedly around 900 hours of material, are said to have been overheard over a longer period of time in several restaurants in Warsaw , such as the Amber Room of the Sobański Palace and the restaurant of the Polish celebrity chef Robert Sowa.

On June 18, 2014, on the instructions of the Polish public prosecutor's office, there was a search and an attempt to confiscate data carriers from the editorial office of the publisher. Editors of the Wprost and called journalists from other media prevented this.

The first publications dealt with the relationship between the Polish central bank, which is independent by law, and the Polish government. From one of the reproduced conversations between central bank chief Marek Belka and interior minister Bartłomiej Sienkiewicz it could be inferred that the overthrow of the then finance minister Jacek Rostowski was planned. In addition, the National Bank was supposed to cover part of the national deficit. The reason for this was, among other things, the significant strengthening of the then opposition party Law and Justice at the opinion research institute CBOS.

In a further published recording, the Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski expressed himself in vulgar language critical of Poland's relationship with the USA and described it as "worthless".

The Wprost editorial team announced the publication of further discussions. Deputy Prime Minister Elżbieta Bieńkowska , the head of the Central Anti-Corruption Authority Paweł Wojtunik , the entrepreneur Jan Kulczyk and the head of the Supreme Control Chamber (NIK) Krzysztof Kwiatkowski were named ,

On June 18, 2014, Polish President Bronisław Komorowski recommended that the government resign over the affair. However, this was initially rejected by Prime Minister Donald Tusk and those involved in the affair. On June 25, 2014, Tusk put the vote of confidence in the Sejm . 237 of a total of 440 MPs expressed their confidence in the government, 203 voted against it. At least 231 votes would have been required.

So far it has remained unclear who is behind the wiretapping. Speculation included involvement by members of Polish or Russian intelligence agencies, political opponents, or disgruntled Polish businessmen. The first arrests were made on June 24, 2014. So far, two restaurant employees and a businessman have been affected.

June 2015

After the government survived the 2014 affair largely unscathed, it came back into public a year later. On the night of June 9, 2015, businessman Zbigniew Stonoga posted over 2,500 secret pages of files from the public prosecutor's investigation into the affair on his Facebook profile. He said he found the documents on a Chinese website. According to the investigating attorney general, all parties to the proceedings and their lawyers, at least 20 people, had access to the documents.

Based on the publications, Prime Minister Ewa Kopacz dismissed three of her ministers and several top officials involved in the affair on June 10, 2015; The former Foreign Minister, Sejm Marshal Radosław Sikorski, announced his resignation on the same day. These measures are generally interpreted as an attempted liberation from the civil platform, which was weakened after the presidential election was lost . The parliamentary elections in autumn 2015 has nevertheless lost the Civic Platform.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Shift to the right in Poland - national conservatives face an absolute majority. In: Focus Online , October 26, 2015.
  2. ↑ Martin Adam, wiretapping affair in Poland: Tusk no longer excludes new elections from June 19, 2014 at Spiegel Online (accessed on June 24, 2014)
  3. ↑ The eavesdropping affair shakes the country: In Poland there are signs of new elections on June 19, 2014 at n-tv.de (accessed on June 24, 2014)
  4. ↑ Robert Sowa wydał oświadczenie ws. taśm "wprost". In: wp.pl. May 16, 2014, accessed September 6, 2015 (Polish).
  5. ↑ Konrad Schuller, wiretapping affair in Poland: Dangerous men's jokes at FAZ.net from June 23, 2014 (accessed June 24, 2014)
  6. ↑ Poland leak: Radek Sikorski scorns 'worthless' US ties. BBC News, June 23, 2014, accessed June 25, 2014 .
  7. ↑ Sikorski na Twitterze: Murzyńskość = Négritude, a to znaczy… Gazeta Prawna, June 22, 2014, accessed on June 25, 2014 (Polish).
  8. ↑ Warsaw bugging affair expands from June 23, 2014 in the online edition of the Wiener Zeitung (accessed on June 25, 2014)
  9. ↑ Deal with central bank chief: wiretapping scandal plunges Poland in government crisis on June 19, 2014 at Handelsblatt Online (accessed on June 24, 2014)
  10. ↑ wiretapping affair in Poland: Tusk wins vote of confidence. tagesschau.de, June 25, 2014, archived from the original on June 27, 2014 ; Retrieved June 26, 2014 .
  11. ↑ Who is behind the wiretapping affair? from June 24, 2014 from Zeit Online (accessed June 25, 2014)
  12. ↑ Arrests in the Polish wiretapping affair of June 24, 2014 on the SRF website (accessed June 26, 2014)
  13. ↑ Konrad Schuller, wiretapping affair in Poland: Much remains in the dark from June 27, 2014 at FAZ.net (accessed on June 30, 2014)
  14. ↑ a b c Meret Baumann: Numerous ministerial resignations. Late shock wave of the wiretapping affair in Poland. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung , June 10, 2015.
  15. ↑ Florian Hassel: Escape to the front , in: Süddeutsche Zeitung , June 12, 2015, p. 7