Former Polish justice minister Ziobro stripped of immunity to face charges for 26 alleged crimes

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Former justice minister Zbigniew Ziobro, one of the most powerful figures in Poland’s previous national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) government, has been stripped of legal immunity by parliament to facecharges for 26 alleged crimes.

Parliament, where the current ruling coalition has a majority and PiS is now in opposition, also approved a request from prosecutors to place Ziobro in pretrial detention.

However, it remains unclear when, how and even if Ziobro will be detained and charged, given that he is currently in Hungary, whose government is closely allied with PiS. One of Ziobro’s former deputies was last year granted political asylum by Hungary after fleeing arrest in Poland.

Last week, Waldermar Żurek, who serves as justice minister and prosecutor general, asked parliament to strip Ziobro of the legal immunity that is granted to all MPs unless a majority of their colleagues vote to remove it.

Prosecutors want to charge Ziobro with a long list of alleged offences committed when he served in the former PiS government from 2015 to 2023, including establishing and leading a criminal group and abusing his powers for personal and political gain. If found guilty, he could face up to 25 years in prison.

In a series of votes on Friday evening, a majority of members of the Sejm approved the lifting of Ziobro’s immunity for each of the 26 charges against him as well as for him to be placed in pretrial detention.

The four main groups that belong to the ruling coalition – the centrist Civic Coalition (KO) and Poland 2050 (Polska 2050), centre-right Polish People’s Party (PSL) and The Left (Lewica) – voted consistently to lift Ziobro’s immunity. In many of the votes they were joined by the far-right Confederation (Konfederacja).

The move marks a major step in efforts by Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government, which replaced PiS in office in December 2023, to bring former PiS officials to account for alleged crimes.

Ziobro was one of the key figures during PiS’s time in office, overseeing a radical and highly contested overhaul of the judiciary. Two of his former deputy justice ministers are already facing charges for alleged crimes.

The 26 offences Ziobro is accused of relate to the administration of the Justice Fund, which is managed by the justice ministry and is meant to be used to support victims of crime, as well as for certain other initiatives to reduce crime or rehabilitate criminals.

However, Ziobro was regularly accused of using the fund for political purposes and, in one case, to unlawfully finance the purchase of Israeli-made Pegasus spyware, which was in turn used to surveil figures opposed to the PiS government.

Ziobro denies that any misuse of the Justice Fund took place and claims that prosecutors are now pursuing him on the Tusk government’s orders as part of a “political vendetta”.

The day before Żurek submitted his request to parliament to lift Ziobro’s immunity, Ziobro announced that he had arrived in Budapest for a pre-arranged event at which he said he would “show my Hungarian friends” how Tusk’s government is “violating laws”.

In the ten days since then, Ziobro had remained in Hungary. He even met with Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who posted a picture of the pair together and condemned the “witch hunt” against the Polish right launched by “the pro-Brusselian Polish government”.

Speaking from Budapest on Thursday, Ziobro claimed that he had planned to return to Poland, and even had a ticket booked. But he changed his mind after receiving information that the authorities were planning to detain him on arrival based on “false testimony”.

“I have no intention of playing into [Tusk’s] script or helping his criminal gang with what they’re up to,” said Ziobro, quoted by the Polish Press Agency (PAP). “He can be sure of one thing: I will fight for the truth and will not allow myself to be silenced by criminal actions.”

Ziobro, who has been undergoing treatment for cancer, has also received support from PiS’s powerful party leader Jarosław Kaczyński, who said that the treatment of his colleague is “characteristic of totalitarian states”. Kaczyński added that “any democratic country with decent courts” would grant Ziobro asylum.

Last year, one of Ziobro’s former deputy justice ministers fled to Hungary after police in Poland issued an arrest warrant for him. He was subsequently granted political asylum there, prompting a diplomatic dispute that resulted in Poland withdrawing its ambassador from Budapest.

Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Main image credit: Kancelaria Premiera / flickr.com (under public domain)

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.