… advocating for China and the European Union to reach a deal on … the investment deal with the EU revolve around access to the …
China’s top diplomat dismisses European rights concerns
PARIS (AP) — In a story published August 30, 2020, The Associated Press reported that Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi defended detention camps for mostly Muslim ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang region, brushing off human rights concerns by European countries. The story should have made clear that he did not refer to the camps as “reeducation centers.”
Copyright © 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.
UN agencies appeal for the disembarkation of migrants on rescue ships – Vatican News
By Susy Hodges
The two UN agencies said they were deeply concerned about the continued absence of dedicated EU-led search and rescue capacity in the Central Mediterranean.
Italy’s coastguard on Saturday evacuated 49 people from an overloaded rescue vessel named Louise Michel that is funded by the British artist Banksy. Those evacuated included 32 women and 13 children.
The crew of Louise Michel had earlier issued a series of tweets calling for immediate assistance from the authorities in Italy, Malta and Germany. They said they were stranded and overloaded with 219 migrants picked up off the coast of Libya over the previous 2 days.
One tweet said the boat was unable to move due to her overcrowded deck and were also carrying the body of a migrant who had died earlier.
The crew accused the European authorities of not responding adequately to their appeals for help.
Shortly after the evacuation of the most vulnerable migrants, another rescue boat, Sea Watch 4, took the remainder of the Louise Michel’s 150 migrants on board. It said it was now carrying a total of 350 people who needed to disembark as soon as possible.
A third boat also needs assistance. A group of 27 migrants and refugees, including a pregnant woman and children from Libya, have been aboard the commercial tanker Maersk Etienne since their rescue on August the 5th.
The two UN agencies said the lack of a deal on a regional landing system could not be an excuse to deny vulnerable people safe harbour and stressed the humanitarian imperative of saving lives should not be penalized or stigmatized.
The Louise Michel rescue boat funded by Banksy only started operating last week in the Mediterranean. The artist posted a video on his official Instagram page saying he had bought the Louise Michel because, he claimed, the EU authorities deliberately ignore distress calls from non-Europeans.
Italy is the destination of most migrants who embark on the often dangerous journey of crossing the Mediterranean from the coast of Libya in recent years.
According to UN data, 443 people have died or have gone missing trying to cross the Mediterranean in 2020. In a speech to the European parliament in 2014, Pope Francis urged leaders not to allow the Mediterranean to become a vast cemetery for those migrants risking their lives trying to reach the continent.
EU hope for dialogue as Mediterranean energy dispute continues – Vatican News
By Nathan Morley
This long-running dispute between Greece and Turkey, which are both NATO members, shows no sign of abating.
Tensions have heated up as Turkish crews search for gas in the waters off Greek islands in the eastern Mediterranean. The Turkish research vessel “Oruc Reis” is probing for deposits south of the Turkish coast in waters which Athens claims jurisdiction.
To add muscle to their prospecting endeavours, the Turkish energy ship has been shadowed by powerful naval vessels.
Ankara argues that the area is part of its continental shelf. To make matters worse, Greece has complained of Turkish Air Force jets making an incursion into its airspace.
There is a similar conflict playing-out near Cyprus, an island where rich natural gas reserves have already been discovered.
Call for calm
In an effort to calm nerves, the German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas has warned that any small spark ‘could lead to catastrophe.’
Germany has been trying to mediate in the dispute for weeks with Chancellor Angela Merkel speaking on the phone several times with Turkish President Tayipp Erdogan and the Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
For its part, the European Union has called on Turkey to immediately halt energy exploration in the disputed waters, dangling the threat of new sanctions if tensions don’t simmer down.
Last week, the Greek Foreign Minister endorsed that call for sanctions against Turkey by the EU – of which Greece is a member. He said Turkey represented a ‘neo-Ottoman ideology’ and was attempting ‘unlimited expansionism’ in the eastern Mediterranean.
However, despite the calls for calm, there seems to be no sign of tensions calming. As it stands, both Greece and Turkey are ratcheting up the tension by staging large naval drills.
Military drills
Turkey said it would carry out live-fire military exercises until mid-September in a zone off the southern Turkish town of Anamur, just north of Cyprus. This comes in addition to a bulletin that Ankara would also hold military exercises in a zone further east.
The European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Brussels was determined to show solidarity with Greece and Cyprus.
“We must walk a fine line between preserving a true space for dialogue and, at the same time, showing collective strength in the defence of our common interests,” he told reporters.
The heads of European states will discuss fraught relations with Ankara in an upcoming summit next month.
Waha Capital launches income generating Islamic…
Abu Dhabi-listed investment firm Waha Capital has launched an income-focused Islamic fund to attract over $500 million (Dh1.83 billion) to invest in Shariah-compliant assets across sukuk and equity markets which will have a global outreach for investments.
The open-ended “Waha Islamic Income Fund SP” adds to Waha Capital’s existing three funds and is targeted at large regional institutions.
Its Waha Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa Credit Fund has achieved a cumulative return of over 180 per cent since its inception in 2012 and the end of 2019. The Waha Mena Equity Fund, launched in 2014, has achieved a cumulative return of 175 per cent since inception while Waha’s Mena Value Fund SP fund produced a return of 25.34 per cent in 2019 and overall by 56.1 per cent since its launch in 2015.
Amr Al Menhali, CEO of Waha Capital, said the new fund will invest in entities that have relatively low gearing.
“While our existing funds have some Shariah-compliant elements in them, there has been a steadily growing demand from our existing clients over the past couple of years for us to develop such a fully-fledged Islamic fund. We are confident that the new fund will be well received because it avoids investment in prohibited or controversial activities or assets and business sectors that may be considered as particularly risky or potentially volatile,” said Al Menhali.
On August 22, Waha Capital invested Dh184 million ($50 million) in New York-listed company online travel firm Despegar.com. It plans to invest $150 million in US-listed companies.
Waha Capital posted net profit of Dh267.2 million in Q2 2020 as compared to net loss of Dh124.4 million in Q2 2019 as total impairments fell from Dh109.3 million to Dh10 million. Its share price increased 0.51 per cent to Dh0.990 on Sunday on Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange. – [email protected]
Iran lambastes US, EU for sheltering MEK terrorists
“Aug. 29, the National Day of Fight Against Terrorism, is the time to remember Prz Rajai & PM Bahonar who, 39yrs ago today, were martyred in a bombing by the MEK terrorist group,” the ministry tweeted.
“Despite assassinating 1000s Iranians & fighting alongside Saddam, MEK is sheltered by the U.S. & EU.”
The tweet comes on the occasion of the 1981 assassination of then-president Mohammad Ali Rajaei and prime minister Mohammad Javad Bahonar.
The two and several other officials had convened at the Tehran office of the Iranian prime minister in a meeting of Iran’s Supreme Defense Council when a bomb explosion ripped through the building. Survivors recounted that an aide, identified as Massoud Kashmiri, had brought a briefcase into the conference room and then left. It was revealed later that he was an MEK operative, who had infiltrated the then-prime minister’s office disguised as a state security official, according to Press TV.
The MEK terrorist group has conducted numerous assassinations and bombings against Iranian statesmen and civilians since the 1979 victory of Iran’s Islamic Revolution. Its members fled Iran in 1986 for Iraq, where they enjoyed Saddam’s backing. Out of the nearly 17,000 Iranians killed in terrorist assaults since the Revolution, about 12,000 have fallen victim to the MEK’s acts of terror.
A few years ago, MEK elements were relocated from their Camp Ashraf in Iraq’s Diyala Province to Camp Hurriyet (Camp Liberty), a former US military base in Baghdad, and later sent to Albania.
MEK terrorists enjoy freedom of activity in the US and Europe and even hold meetings with American and EU officials.
MNA/5004451
Europe’s Most-Enduring Leader Faces Biggest Test in Balkan Vote
… three decades of dominance by Europe’s most enduring leader.
President … parties vying to join the European Union to euroskeptics and pro … elections.
Read More: Why EU’s Balkan Expansion Faces Long … approval of a law on religious groups that may strip the …
‘Wisdom’ of Guatemala’s indigenous people needed for sustainable development: a UN Resident Coordinator blog
“Now more than ever, we must heed the wisdom of indigenous peoples. This wisdom calls upon us to care for the earth so that not only our generation may enjoy it, but that future generations may as well.”
This wisdom is passed down to us through stories and spirits. Consider the example of Nawal, a supernatural spirit of harvests that can take on animal forms, according to Mesoamerican beliefs. On certain days in the indigenous calendar, people call on Nawal for a good harvest. It is a fine thing to have one good harvest. It is even better for the earth to yield its bounty again and again. To enjoy such repeated success, farmers in the area know they must respect the seasons, to plant, to sow, to let the land lay fallow for a time.
This wisdom was also articulated in a declaration from 2012, on an auspicious date in the Mayan calendar. It was Oxlajuj B’aktun or a “change of era,” the end of a cycle that lasts more than 5,000 years. On that date, the three UN entities working with indigenous peoples came together in Guatemala, their first joint meeting outside the UN’s New York headquarters.
Together, they issued a declaration pleading with humanity to respect human rights, promote harmony with nature, and pursue development that respects ancestral wisdom. These three bodies included the Permanent Forum for Indigenous Issues, the Mechanism of Experts on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
This wisdom found its way into “K’atun: Our Guatemala 2032”, the national plan which has guided sustainable development of three successive administrations. It serves as the compass for the country’s UN Cooperation Framework for Sustainable Development 2020-2024, created in collaboration with the Government of Guatemala.
The UN in Guatemala has been supporting K’iche’ indigenous farmers during the pandemic.
Indigenous Guatemalans hit hardest by coronavirus pandemic
To pursue K’atun, we must look at the status of indigenous peoples. In Guatemala, they are amongst the most vulnerable people because they are constantly displaced from their ancestral lands. Data from recent years show that the poverty rate among indigenous people was 79 per cent, almost 30 points above the national average. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic eight out of every 10 indigenous girls, boys and adolescents, live in poverty. Only six finish primary school, only two go to secondary school, and one goes to university. Six in 10 indigenous children under five years of age suffer from chronic malnutrition.
COVID-19 is devastating for all of Guatemala. Many people are sick, some are dying, and countless others are losing their livelihoods because of the disease itself and because the quarantine prevents them from working and earning money.
However hard the pandemic hits Guatemala, it will hit the indigenous peoples even harder. They were already the furthest left behind, and now they will be set back even more. The situation of indigenous women, who are often the main providers for their families, is even more worrisome.
The knowledge held by indigenous people in Guatemala is passed on through stories and art.
Indigenous people hold key to collective survival
And yet, indigenous people are seeking their own solutions, drawing on their own ingenuity. They are using traditional knowledge and practices to contain the disease.
We all must concern ourselves with the wellbeing of indigenous peoples, for their sake. We must respect their wisdom, for their sake. We must protect their human rights, for their sake. We must include them in decision-making, for their sake. It is only right.
But we must also do this for the sake of all Guatemalans. All of Guatemala, indeed, the whole world, has much to learn from indigenous peoples. It is a painful irony that they have been so exploited and oppressed, and yet they may hold a key to our collective survival. It is a painful irony, too, that indigenous people are among those most affected by climate change, and yet they contribute the least to it.
Without indigenous people, neither Guatemala nor the rest of the world will achieve sustainable development. Without indigenous people we cannot enjoy the gifts of the earth and maintain them for all those who will come after us. This is and must be the work of all governments and all people.
75 years ago, the signatories of the United Nations Charter reaffirmed “the dignity and worth of the human person.”
Now, let us reaffirm that belief once more. And let us ensure that indigenous people are included in it.”
Spirit of 2015 a distant memory in Lesbos
Five years ago the olive grove of Moria on the Greek island of Lesbos was a sanctuary for asylum seekers. Today it is a jungle, overcrowded, threatening and all too often in flames.
Destroying an olive tree in Ancient Athens could lead to banishment, now it is the needs of the banished which have seen constant burning back of the sacred olive trees to make more space for the ramshackle tents and makeshift shelters.
Other fires regularly spring up, sometimes lit by migrants for heating or cooking, sometimes by angry inhabitants prompting the sirens of the firefighters to mingle with the voice of the muezzin, leading evening prayers.
Moria is home to nearly 13,000 asylum seekers.
Five years ago, the largest camp in Europe was intended to accommodate no more than 2,770.
Asylum seekers disembarking on the northern coasts of the island, close to the Turkish shores, were just passing through, registering, before moving their journey on.
Moria was but a stopover on their way to Northern Europe.
Back then, Lesbos was the island of solidarity, a welcoming refuge where fishermen came to the aid of drifting boats loaded with migrants, and grandmothers who bottle-fed migrant babies were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
A year later, Pope Francis arrived with Bartholomew I, the spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians, mixing with the migrants and holding a mass to bless those who had died trying to reach Europe.
That all now seems a distant memory.
“At first, asylum seekers came and went but now the borders are closed,” Ilias Pikoulos, who, with his travel agency, hires buses to transport refugees, told AFP.
“The islanders have the impression that they have been facing this migration crisis on their own for years.
An aerial photograph, taken in June 2020, showing the extent of the improvised camp at Moria
ARIS MESSINIS, AFP
“And this feeling has created division, even revolt.”
In 2015, the island of Lesbos and its 85,000 inhabitants saw more than 450,000 people pass through in the space of a year.
The EU-Turkey agreement signed in March 2016 aimed to change that.
Its objective was to stop the flow coming from the Turkish coasts and send back the Syrians for whom Turkey was considered a “safe country”.
But the arrivals did not dry up and the Moria camp was quickly overwhelmed.
- ‘The refugees have ruined us’ –
Ioanna Savva, from the village of Eressos, birthplace of the ancient poet Sappho, took part in rescuing refugees and “cried” when she saw them.
“But in everyone’s eyes, Lesbos has become the island of refugees,” she says.
“The refugees have ruined us. The money that comes from organisations and the European Union amounts to millions, but the inhabitants of the island have to tighten their belts just to live.”
On top of this frustration, there is the violence against people who come to the aid of migrants.
Migrants pray during Muharram celebrations at the refugee camp of Moria
ANGELOS TZORTZINIS, AFP
In March, Astrid Castelein, the representative in Lesbos of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, was targeted.
When angry residents prevented migrants from disembarking from their overloaded canoe in the port of Thermis, Castelein tried to calm the crowd but was assaulted.
“Has solidarity given way to xenophobia in Lesbos?” she asks in comments to AFP.
“In recent months, the tolerance of the population has decreased because it feels abandoned by the central (Greek) government and by Europe.”
At the end of July, Stratos Kaniamos, a hotelier who wanted to accommodate asylum seekers, also fell victim to violence.
“Individuals set fire to all my air conditioners, to the facades of the building, and to the van which I used to transport customers,” he says.
In 2020, Moria’s megastructure has become, according to several NGOs, “a disgrace for the whole of Europe.”
Prostitution, sexual assault, disappearances of minors, drug trafficking and fights occur almost daily in the camp, where dozens of people have been stabbed, burnt to death in their tents or have committed suicide.
From January to the end of August, five people were stabbed in more than 15 attacks.
- ‘Screams and fights’ –
The coronavirus epidemic, which led to confinement in Moria from March 21, brought a new threat to the most vulnerable.
“For a woman, even the use of the toilet here is a test,” Monire, an Afghan refugee, told AFP.
Even going to the toilet is a ‘test’ for women in Moria as rapes and attacks have increased
ANGELOS TZORTZINIS, AFP
“Every day, we cover our ears so as not to hear the screams and fights. I’m afraid to leave my tent because there are rapes regularly,” continues the 30-something.
Lorraine Leete, a lawyer for the NGO Legal Centre Lesbos, said: “Greece, with the support of the European Commission, clearly continues to apply a policy of containment aimed at curbing migration.”
Now, in hotspots like Moria, Leete says “people are trapped sometimes for years, without sufficient access to water, sanitation, education and medical care”.
Even for those who have been granted asylum in Greece and decided to stay there, the road is still strewn with thorns.
Amir Ali, a 32-year-old Afghan who arrived in Greece in 2016, has won several local track and field championships, and made friendships on the island.
But, despite everything, he feels he still suffers from racism.
“At the supermarket, everyone treats me like a beggar,” he says. “But I work, I pay taxes here.”
What will the EU do to tackle the towns declaring themselves to be LGBT-free zones?
Michal is a mild-mannered 19-year-old. He describes himself as ‘a bit of a nerd’, plans a career making videos and came out as gay before leaving school last year.
‘I did not make a big deal of it and tell everyone, but just started incorporating talk about my boyfriend in conversations,’ he told me as we sat in the sun.
His parents were supportive and his classmates seemed unbothered.
Yet Michal lives in a small market town in southern Poland that has declared itself an ‘LGBT-free zone’, sparking a furore that has sent shockwaves throughout Europe.
Michal says: ‘I did not choose to be gay. But the ruling party chose to make an enemy of people like me, which is very sad’
Tuchow, a town of 6,500 people that lies 65 miles east of Krakow, is among a wave of Polish communities making such declarations after the country’s ruling Right-wing party ramped up rhetoric against ‘the cult of LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender] ideology’.
Politicians, priests and popular newspapers have called on people to stand firm against ‘a rainbow plague’ invading from abroad, even comparing its threat to the Communists and Nazis that so devastated their country last century.
Yet as Michal says: ‘I did not choose to be gay. But the ruling party chose to make an enemy of people like me, which is very sad.’
![Tuchow, a town of 6,500 people that lies 65 miles east of Krakow, is among a wave of Polish communities making such declarations after the country’s ruling Right-wing party ramped up rhetoric against ‘the cult of LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender] ideology’](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2020/08/29/23/32549158-8677743-image-a-2_1598741297102.jpg "What will the EU do to tackle the towns declaring themselves to be LGBT-free zones? 11")
Tuchow, a town of 6,500 people that lies 65 miles east of Krakow, is among a wave of Polish communities making such declarations after the country’s ruling Right-wing party ramped up rhetoric against ‘the cult of LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender] ideology’
The LGBT-free zone decision, taken by a small commune in the conservative rural heartlands of a Catholic country, strikes at the principles of the EU – of which Poland has been a member since 2004 – which was founded on shared values of democracy, freedom and tolerance.
One prominent politician called it a chilling echo from previous times in a town barely 100 miles from Auschwitz.
‘I learned in history books about Jew-free schools and shops and now they talk of LGBT-free towns,’ said Robert Biedron, a gay MEP from the liberal Left. ‘It reminds us of terrible times in the past.’
In a highly symbolic move, Tuchow and five other towns making similar anti-gay declarations had funding requests for twinning projects rejected last month by Brussels.
One horrified French commune has also suspended ties after 25 years.
But fears remain that Brussels is avoiding taking tougher action against both Poland and Hungary, despite seeing the two countries’ hardline populist leaders chip away at some core values of democracy such as freedom of the press, human rights and judicial independence.
‘Europe must defend its values,’ said Biedron.
‘But the trouble is our government is Eurosceptic so it will say the horrid West will not protect our children in Poland.’
This issue flared up last year after Rafal Trzaskowski, the centrist mayor of Warsaw, signed a landmark pledge of support for LGBT citizens that included anti-discrimination lessons in schools.
With elections looming, this was seized upon by the ruling Right-wing Law and Justice party in conjunction with the Catholic Church.
They claimed it was a threat to family values, arguing that it would sexualise children and ‘propagate paedophilia’.
As the issue found traction with conservative voters, the rhetoric became cruder with ‘imported LGBT ideology’ compared to the social engineering of Nazis and Communists.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the party leader who really runs Poland, calls homosexuality ‘a threat to Polish identity, to our nation, to its existence and thus to the Polish state’
Marek Jedraszewski, archbishop of Krakow, even used last year’s 75th anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising that tried to liberate the capital from the Nazis to denounce ‘a rainbow plague…born of the same neo-Marxist spirit’ as Bolshevism ‘that wants to control our souls, our hearts and minds.’
Then the Law and Justice party made this subject a central issue in last month’s presidential election, with its incumbent candidate Andrzej Duda claiming gay ‘ideology’ was more destructive than Communism and being ‘smuggled’ into schools.
He beat Trzaskowski by a small margin.
Meanwhile, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the party leader who really runs Poland, calls homosexuality ‘a threat to Polish identity, to our nation, to its existence and thus to the Polish state’.
Others claim Poland – which decriminalised homosexuality almost a century ago, before other European nations – is trying to protect family values against ‘alien’ concepts such as gay marriage and gender fluidity.
‘It’s not fashionable to talk about Christian and traditional values but people see them as being disrupted in a way that is as alien to their country as Communism,’ said one sympathetic analyst, adding: ‘This is not to say that we are anti-homosexuals.’
Such thoughts were echoed by party officials in Tuchow.
‘I don’t think homosexuals are worse than other people,’ said Grzegorz Niemiec, 32, a city councillor.
‘But the Polish model of family, with men and women being married, is a traditional one we should defend.’
He said ‘LGBT-free zones’ were designed to protect children in schools, claiming there was international pressure to enforce sex education and inflict gender choice on primary school pupils as young as four.
One man in the town who firmly agrees with the policy is Henryk Trebaczkiewicz, 75.
He said: ‘Communism was a plague and now we have the LGBT plague. This ideology is a danger not just to Poland but the whole world.’
The former factory worker, who I found reading in a rosary garden funded by the EU, said Brussels had made a mistake by cutting some of the town’s funding.
His solution? ‘We should treat these people medically to help them become heterosexual.’
Then the Law and Justice party made this subject a central issue in last month’s presidential election, with its incumbent candidate Andrzej Duda claiming gay ‘ideology’ was more destructive than Communism and being ‘smuggled’ into schools
It was depressing to hear talk of homosexuality as a disease, especially in a state where more than two-thirds of LGBT citizens say they have suffered hate attacks.
‘We are witnessing the manifestation of ignorance,’ said one activist.
The mother of a gay man who killed himself in June warned a newspaper that there would be more victims if political leaders did not desist from hate-filled rhetoric.
‘Such people destroyed my son – day by day and step by step,’ said Katarzyna Koch. ‘Every day I ask myself: What is this country where you have to die to be happy?’
Earlier this year Poland was branded the worst country in the EU for LGBT people by a Brussels-based advocacy group.
A gay pride march in the city of Bialystok last summer ended in violent clashes after it was attacked and stoned by opponents.
One Krakow teacher told me she could not tell colleagues she was lesbian for fear of being sacked – yet ironically since her partner had come out as transgender, she could start talking about having a boyfriend.
Most people I met in Tuchow opposed the town’s anti-gay declaration.
‘I am ashamed,’ said Magdalena Pawlak, a school teacher sitting near the town hall with her daughter Amelia, nine.
‘I don’t know why this hatred has to be spread so much.’
Taxi driver Piotr Wojtanowski said almost all his friends were opposed to the stance. ‘
There is so much scaremongering about adoption and sexualisation of children.
‘I know a lesbian couple living here illegally with children and they seem fine.’
He said he had stopped going to church because of anti-gay propaganda from the pulpit.
An anti-LGBT banner is seen during the 76th Anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising on August 01, 2020 in Warsaw, Poland
‘When an archbishop compares LGBT ideology to a plague, that is unacceptable. I’m religious but was taught to love my neighbours, not hate them.’
Equality campaigners argue that the Catholic Church’s stridency on the issue is a cynical attempt to cover up its culpability in failing to tackle appalling cases of paedophilia by priests.
Certainly the eruption of the furore last year coincided with a damning TV documentary that sparked uproar in Poland by exposing how church leaders for decades had buried complaints of abuse and disgracefully moved accused priests to new parishes.
Yet it was also triggered after Trzaskowski – the first Warsaw mayor to attend the LGBT equality parade in this culturally conservative country – entered the presidential race as the candidate for the centrist Civic Platform party and his poll ratings surged.
‘This government is quite cynical,’ said Trzaskowski. ‘They thought they could stir up voters over LGBT issues by portraying it as this foreign ideology threatening decent Polish families.’
Trzaskowski also told me it had been a mistake to talk about LGBT, an unfamiliar term in Poland, rather than phrases such as equality for gay and transgender citizens. ‘These are new issues here, so it is hard to discuss them in an informed way.’
Yet as he argues, populism is on the rise in many places – and the Law and Justice party is crudely exploiting social divisions seen in several other democracies, including Britain and the United States, between cities and countryside, old and young, rich and poor.
Poland has had a remarkable run of economic success since Communism ended in 1989, with growth stretching back 28 years aided by huge Brussels handouts.
I noticed, for instance, they funded the road I drove along from Krakow to Tuchow.
Yet Trzaskowski admits his party shares some responsibility for some disenchantment in struggling communities from its time in government between 2007 and 2015. ‘We were changing the country so rapidly,’ he said.
‘But some people said they’d had enough of paternalistic elites telling them to be happy when gaps were widening.’
Or as Nina Gabrys, who heads the equality committee on Krakow city council, says: ‘We were building bridges but left behind the people who wanted their country back. Now this is being done in the most horrible way.’
The Law and Justice party cleverly exploited such concerns under its leader Kaczynski, a wily 71-year-old political operator who started out as an anti-Soviet activist.
Protesters wear protective face masks and shout slogans as they take part in a protest against discrimination of the LGBT community two days before the Presidential elections runoff at Krakow’s UNESCO listed Main Square on July 10, 2020 in Krakow, Poland
A lifelong bachelor and strong nationalist, Kaczynski has never owned a computer, only opened his first bank account in 2009 and has taken just one holiday outside Poland to visit cousins in neighbouring Ukraine.
His party’s stance on several other issues has sparked alarm across Europe, especially its bid to control the judiciary with purges and pack sympathisers on key courts.
‘We’re still a democracy but democracy is under attack,’ said Warsaw mayor Trzaskowski.
There have also been concerns over the politicisation of the security services, turning state-owned media into propaganda organs, putting pressure on charities with foreign links and anti-German rhetoric, including demands for huge war reparations.
In recent days, there have been fresh threats made against German-owned media along with an outcry over Berlin’s appointment of a new ambassador whose father was one of Hitler’s military aides.
‘I can remember Communist times and it was much more subtle in terms of propaganda than it is now,’ said one leading political figure.
However, the situation is not nearly as bad as in Hungary, where autocratic prime minister Viktor Orban poses as a defender of traditional Christian values, takes pride in creation of the ‘illiberal state’ and scorns EU elites while his wealthy cronies milk the system.
Hungary, and now Poland, have shown Brussels’ weakness in face of aggressive threats to the EU’s core values.
Last month, the two nations fought off attempts to link spending by Brussels to compliance with the rule of law.
Police remove a protester wearing a shirt saying ‘love’ with rainbow colours as he protests during Duda’s swearing in ceremony on August 6
Eight months ago, the European Parliament condemned bigotry against LGBT citizens and told Poland’s government to revoke the hostile declarations being made by towns such as Tuchow.
Its demand was ignored.
Then the Warsaw government gleefully stepped in to make up the town’s loss of income after Brussels rejected its application for a grant of up to £22,000 under its twinning programme – and handed it more than twice that sum.
‘We are supporting a municipality that promotes support for well-functioning families and fights against the imposed ideology of LGBT and gender, which is being pushed by the European Commission,’ said Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro.
The courts’ failed attempts to stand up to the Polish government’s hardline agenda have dismayed activists such as Artur Barbara Kapturkiewicz, a transgender doctor and co-founder of a Christian group called the Faith and Rainbow Foundation.
‘These people think that Poland is the only moral country that will reawaken the West and renew Christian values,’ he says.
‘But this is the politics of discrimination and dehumanisation – and it soils our nation.’
