Latest news with #politicalPolarisation
South China Morning Post
04-08-2025
- Politics
- South China Morning Post
Poland braces for confrontation between incoming president and prime minister
Poland's new pro-Trump, nationalist president takes office this week, setting the scene for major confrontation with a prime minister whose government he has branded 'the worst in history'. Advertisement Karol Nawrocki, a political novice, will be inaugurated on Wednesday after winning a June 1 election in a major blow for Prime Minister Donald Tusk's pro-EU government. Nawrocki's close-run victory against liberal candidate Rafal Trzaskowski confirmed the high degree of political polarisation in the EU and Nato member state, a key supporter of its neighbour Ukraine. Presidents in Poland can initiate as well as veto legislation, and have some influence over the country's foreign and defence policies. Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk. File photo: AP The current president, Andrzej Duda, had already been at loggerheads with Tusk over many issues, including easing an almost total ban on abortion.
Yahoo
04-08-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Poland braces for clashes with new nationalist president
Poland's new pro-Trump, nationalist president takes office this week, setting the scene for major confrontation with a prime minister he has branded "the worst in history". Karol Nawrocki, a political novice, will be inaugurated Wednesday after winning a June 1 election in a major blow for Prime Minister Donald Tusk's pro-EU government. Nawrocki's close-run victory against liberal candidate Rafal Trzaskowski confirmed the high degree of political polarisation in the EU and NATO member state, a key supporter of its neighbour Ukraine. Presidents in Poland can initiate as well as veto legislation, and have some influence over the country's foreign and defence policies. The current president, Andrzej Duda, had already been at loggerheads with Tusk over many issues, including easing an almost total ban on abortion. But relations are likely to be even worse under Nawrocki as the political climate heats up ahead of parliamentary elections planned for 2027, analysts said. "I have no doubt that Mr Nawrocki will do everything to annoy us," said Tusk, who warned that he would not let Nawrocki "demolish" his government. Speaking in an interview with the TVN news channel, Tusk also emphasised that the country's policies were "my responsibility and will remain so". Nawrocki has repeatedly branded Tusk's government as "the worst in the history" of democratic Poland. He has promised to be "an active president" from the start and has said he wants to "stimulate" the government with various bills. The government holds a parliamentary majority but the two sides may be forced to make some compromises. "Both parties should realise that engaging in intense confrontation is obviously not the way forward," said Piotr Trudnowski, a member of Klub Jagiellonski, a Christian-Democrat think tank. - 'Poland First, Poles First' - Ewa Marciniak, a political scientist at the University of Warsaw, said that Nawrocki would have to work together with the government on foreign policy -- an area in which he has "no experience". During the election campaign, he highlighted the importance of ties with the United States. An admirer of US President Donald Trump, Nawrocki met with the US leader briefly at the White House shortly before the first round of the election. "It is precisely from this that he will build his foreign policy, at least initially," Marciniak said. Nawrocki will face a highly experienced pro-EU duo -- Tusk, a former president of the European Council, and Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski. Trudnowski said Nawrocki would "not be as enthusiastic" as his predecessor on ties with Ukraine. During his campaign, Nawrocki opposed the idea of NATO membership for Ukraine and criticised Kyiv for not having "shown gratitude for what the Poles have done". Under his slogan "Poland First, Poles First", he was critical of some of the benefits received by the more than one million Ukrainian refugees in the country. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has congratulated Nawrocki and emphasised the importance of close ties with Poland -- a vital transit country for military and humanitarian supplies to Ukraine. After speaking to Nawrocki by phone on Thursday, Zelensky said the two had agreed to visit each other and seek forms of cooperation "that will bring real results for both our countries and our people". Zelensky said he was "thankful for the readiness to work together and for the assurance of continued support for Ukraine". sw/dt/gv/tc
Khaleej Times
20-05-2025
- Politics
- Khaleej Times
Elections, Gaza, polarisation drive political crime to record high in Germany
A series of closely fought elections, the war in Gaza and deepening political polarisation helped drive the number of politically motivated crimes in Germany to a record high last year, with an especially sharp growth in far-right violence. The number of such offences recorded by police surged 40.2% to 84,172 in 2024, a report published on Tuesday by the Interior Ministry showed, a record since such data began to be collected in 2001. The number of violent political crimes rose 15% to 4,107, the highest level since 2016. "Last year we saw a massive expansion of politically motivated crime coming from the right," conservative Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt told a news conference at which the figures were announced. "Forty-five per cent of the victims of politically motivated violence were injured by right-wing perpetrators," he said. He gave the example of assaults on gay pride parades by organised groups of far-right young people last summer. Elsewhere, police recorded increased numbers of attacks on migrants, especially after several high-profile car-ramming and stabbing attacks on public events by immigrants, some of them asylum seekers. There have also been an increase in politically motivated crimes by the far left though such offences were far less likely to be violent, the data indicated. Like other Western countries, Germany has been afflicted by tensions resulting from the rise of the populist far right, economic uncertainty and growing anger, especially among immigrant communities, at the government's support for Israel in its war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The far-right Alternative for Germany scored its best-ever results in five elections — three regional, one national and one European — in 2024, calling for tighter immigration controls and even a departure from the European Union. The nativist party was earlier this month officially classified as "right-extremist" by Germany's security services, which listed cases of its politicians dismissing naturalised immigrants as "passport Germans". But Dobrindt said he saw no reason to ban the AfD, a move some politicians have advocated. The AfD, now the second largest party in parliament, has denied posing a threat to democracy, says it opposes violence and has brought a legal challenge against authorities' characterisation of it as extremist. "To ban a party we have to have evidence of an attack on the rule of law and democracy," Dobrindt said, "and the security services' recent assessment doesn't sufficiently demonstrate that."
