Polish ex-ministers head for jail as police swoop on presidential palace

By Karol Badohal

WARSAW (Reuters) -Police entered Poland's presidential palace to detain two of their former bosses on Tuesday, executing a court order to take the ex-interior minister and his deputy to prison and escalating a row between the head of state and the new government.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk had earlier accused President Andrzej Duda of obstructing justice after the two lawmakers appeared at the palace, prompting police to search for them in cars leaving the building.

The accusations over the two lawmakers - Mariusz Kaminski and Maciej Wasik - were the latest salvo in a row that is likely to be one of many during a period of cohabitation in which the government and president are from different political camps.

"We would like to inform you that in accordance with the court order, the persons concerned by the instructions were detained," the police said in a post on social media platform X.

New Interior Minister Marcin Kierwinski said "everyone is equal before the law".

Hundreds of protesters gathered in front of the presidential palace at the behest of the nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) party, of which Kaminski and Wasik are members.

The crowd chanted "Free political prisoners" and "Shame!"

In a post on X, PiS spokesperson Rafał Bochenek called the police's actions earlier in the day "an illegal kidnapping and a violation of all democratic rules".

Tusk, a former top European Union official, became prime minister after an October election in which PiS lost power after eight years of government marred by conflict with Brussels and accusations of subversion of democratic standards.

PARDON

In 2015, weeks following PiS' assumption of power, Duda issued a pardon to Kaminski after he was convicted of abuse of power in a previous role as head of Poland's Central Anti-Corruption Bureau. The pardon allowed him to become interior minister. Kaminski had been accused of allowing agents under his command to use entrapment in an investigation. He denied wrongdoing.

Lawyers questioned whether Duda could pardon Kaminski before an appeals court had issued a final ruling. The Supreme Court said last year the case should be reopened and Kaminski and Wasik, his deputy in the interior ministry, were sentenced last month to two years in prison for abuse of power.

On Tuesday, the president's office posted a picture of Kaminski and Wasik with Duda at an official event at the palace.

"A sombre dictatorship is being formed. We cannot allow for Poland to hold political prisoners," Kaminski said after the event, before re-entering the building.

According to Szymon Holownia, speaker of the lower house of parliament, or Sejm, the December verdict meant Kaminski and Wasik lost their parliamentary mandates. But both denied that and said they planned to attend the next session of the Sejm.

Duda met Holownia on Monday to try to convince him that his pardon was valid and the court had no right to issue a second verdict, but they did not come to an agreement.

"The sitting planned this week will be moved to next week... There is one reason for this decision - my task is to ensure the dignity of the Sejm and social calm," said Holownia, a member of one of the parties in Tusk's centrist coalition.

Parliament had been due to vote on the 2024 budget at this week's sitting. It has until the end of January to send the budget to Duda for him to sign. If it does not do so, the president is empowered to dissolve parliament.

(Reporting by Anna Wlodarczak-Semczuk, Pawel Florkiewicz, Anna Koper, Karol Badohal, Justyna Pawlak, Alan Charlish; editing by Christina Fincher, Gareth Jones and Mark Heinrich)