After 100 days of horror for Ukraine, Russia’s war has borne strange fruit across Europe. Traditionally neutral Finland and Sweden have signed up to join Nato while the EU-wary Danes now want closer ties to its common security policy. How, then, to assess the peace deal signed on Thursday between Brussels and Warsaw’s government, lead by the national conservative Law and Justice (PiS)?
Both sides have agreed to end a seven-year standoff over how – and by whom – Polish judges are appointed, and how their work is monitored. Far-reaching judicial reforms by PiS, ostensibly to streamline the courts, were attacked by critics as an attempt to bring judicial appointments – and, by extension, rulings – under direct control of the ruling party.
For seven years, while Poland insisted it was engaged in a technocratic dispute with Brussels, EU officials – and judges at the continent’s highest courts – insisted this was about something fundamental.
Without mutual member state trust in each others’ courts, there is no internal market and, thus, no EU. On Thursday, in a daring show of political pragmatism, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen overrode her leading officials’ concerns to sign off on Poland’s share of the EU coronavirus recovery fund.
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Some €36 billion in grants and loans can be drawn down, to boost energy independence and digital infrastructure, if Warsaw agrees to correct the commission’s outstanding judicial concerns.
The show of trust in Warsaw reflects a shift in how Poland is perceived in Europe’s new wartime reality, as a crucial military ally and land of refuge for millions of Ukrainians. But many in Warsaw wonder why, after seven years of dispute, PiS has been granted another 18 months to meet the minimum goals of EU membership.
The litmus test of Thursday’s deal is how PiS treats judges who, since 2015, have been punished for standing up to government reforms. If they are not rehabilitated, and EU money continues to flow, serious questions will be asked of von der Leyen’s commission.