2024-05-06 20:29 update: 2024-05-08, 15:06
Photo PAP/Rafal Guz
A Polish judge, during a press conference in Minsk on Monday, has asked for protection of Belarusian authorities, according to BelTA, the state-owned Belarusian news agency.
Tomasz Szmydt, a judge at the provincial administrative court in Warsaw, gained notoriety in 2019 when, under the previous Law and Justice (PiS) government, he and his then-wife became involved in an online smear campaign against judges critical of judicial reforms conducted by PiS.
On Monday, he reportedly told journalists in Minsk that he was forced to leave Poland "due to disagreement with the policy and actions of the current authorities."
He said that he was persecuted and intimidated for his independent political stance, BelTA reported.
"I allow myself to appeal directly to President Alexander Lukashenko. I am very sorry for my boldness, but I will allow myself to ask for the care and protection of the president and Belarus as a (state)," Szmydt said as cited by the BelTA agency.
He reportedly said that he considers Belarus a "country with great potential" led by a "very wise leader" and a place where "you can live peacefully."
During the press conference, Szmydt presented a letter he had sent to Jacek Chlebny, the president of the Supreme Administrative Court in Warsaw. In the document, whose copy was also submitted to President Andrzej Duda and the National Council of the Judiciary, the judge announced that he was resigning from his current position at the provincial administrative court in Warsaw "effective immediately."
In the letter, whose content was published by Szmydt on the X platform, he said that his resignation was in protest "against the unfair and harmful policy pursued by the authorities of the Republic of Poland towards the Republic of Belarus and the Russian Federation."
"This act is also an expression of protest against actions aimed at bringing my country into a direct armed conflict with the Republic of Belarus and the Russian Federation," it further read.
In 2021, a Polish soldier, Emil Czeczko, also fled to Belarus seeking asylum. The following year, Belarusian authorities announced that he had been found dead after he apparently hanged himself in his home in Minsk.
Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz, a deputy prime minister and the defence minister, has already requested a report on Szmydt's activity from the security services.
"If someone chooses Belarus, it means that he acted in some interest over the years in Poland, (but - PAP) on whose behalf?" he said.
"Shocking information... An absolutely appalling case," Radoslaw Sikorski, the foreign minister, commented shortly after the news was disclosed.
Internal Security Agency (ABW) reported on the X platform that it has already initiated an inspection to "verify the scope of classified information to which the judge had access in connection with his function and cases." (PAP)
mr/jch/mf
