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Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and is published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.
The nationalist leader of a self-proclaimed Border Defence Movement (ROG), which emerged last year to oppose Germany’s policy of returning migrants that had entered illegally from Poland, is to stand trial.
Prosecutors have indicted Robert Bąkiewicz on various criminal charges, including insulting Polish border officers and inciting hatred against Germans and immigrants. If convicted, he could face up to three years in prison.
Akt oskarżenia przeciwko Robertowi B.
Działacz Ruchu Obrony Granic oskarżony o 4 przestępstwa.
Odpowie m. in. za nawoływania do nienawiści na tle narodowościowym i etnicznym, pomówienie i znieważenie funkcjonariuszy.https://t.co/EDawliI5aV pic.twitter.com/ZfMR0OfamA— Prokuratura Okręgowa w Gorzowie Wielkopolskim (@prokuratura_gw) December 31, 2025
Bąkiewicz was once the leader of National Radical Camp (ONR), a prominent far-right group, and the main organiser of the annual nationalist Independence March in Warsaw.
After leaving ONR, in the 2023 parliamentary elections he stood as a candidate for the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS), which was then Poland’s ruling party and is now its main opposition.
PiS selected Bąkiewicz as a candidate despite his conviction earlier that year for physically attacking a female abortion protester. Later, he was partially pardoned of that crime by PiS-aligned President Andrzej Duda.
Last year, Bąkiewicz formed ROG, whose members patrolled Poland’s western border with Germany, seeking to prevent the return of migrants. It was supported and promoted by many figures from PiS. However, the government said that such vigilante groups were making the work of border guards more difficult.
On Tuesday this week, prosecutors in the city of Gorzów Wielkopolski in western Poland announced that Bąkiewicz has been indicted, meaning he will face trial.
The first set of charges he is facing concerns an incident in which he insulted four border guard and military police officers at the border crossing with Germany in the town of Słubice. Prosecutors say that Bąkiewicz “called them traitors” and said they “have no honour” and “disgrace the Polish uniform”.
Insulting a public official in relation to the performance of their duties is a crime in Poland that carries a potential prison sentence of up to one year.
"Citizen patrols" have gathered in Poland at the border to oppose Germany's policy of returning migrants who crossed illegally
They have been supported by the Polish right-wing opposition, which accuses the government of failing to prevent migrant returnshttps://t.co/z2E7mLnz4T
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) June 29, 2025
The second and third set of charges against Bąkiewicz are for defamation, in relation to him sharing images and statements on social media, including accusing certain groups of people of “selling out and betraying Poland”.
Finally, he is charged with inciting hatred based on national, ethnic and racial differences for a series of posts on social media platform X and statements in YouTube interviews that prosecutors say “aroused and intensified feelings of aversion and hostility towards people of German nationality and immigrants”.
That crime is punishable with a prison sentence of up to three years. In their statement, prosecutors said that Bąkiewicz had not admitted to any of the crimes he is accused of and had exercised his right to remain silent.
President Duda has pardoned nationalist leader Robert Bąkiewicz over a case in which he was convicted of involvement in an attack on a well-known abortion protester, known as "Grandma Kate", who was forcibly removed from outside a church https://t.co/FGR1vkNSdt
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) July 15, 2025
However, speaking to conservative news website Niezależna, Bąkiewicz declared that prosecutors’ actions against him were an act of “political revenge”.
“They know that we have awakened millions of Poles on the issue of resistance to mass migration, and I hope this resistance will be even stronger,” he continued. “These false accusations, the entire hypocrisy of prosecutors and the criminals who cooperate with them, will be judged and punished. We are not afraid.”
Meanwhile, Bąkiewicz and his ROG movement have continued their activity. On 30 December, they symbolically drove a border post into the Lusatian Neisse River on the border with Germany.
“This was a clear message: STOP the diktat of Berlin!” declared Bąkiewicz. “Germany won’t spit in our face!”
Tego na granicy jeszcze nie było!
Dziś przeprowadziliśmy akcję na granicy z Niemcami. Wzorem Bolesława Chrobrego wbiliśmy symboliczny słup graniczny na Nysie Łużyckiej.
To był jasny komunikat: STOP dyktatowi Berlina! 🛑
Nie będzie Niemiec pluł nam w twarz! 🇵🇱
________… pic.twitter.com/uoq2E4q5QF— Robert Bąkiewicz (@RBakiewicz) December 30, 2025
Germany’s policy of returning migrants to Poland who had illegally crossed the border sparked controversy last year, despite it being a longstanding practice that had also taken place when PiS was in power.
In response to growing political and social pressure, in July the government announced the reintroduction of controls on its borders with Germany and Lithuania, in an effort to prevent the illegal movement of migrants. Those measures remain in place.
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: Nicole Wójcik/Wikimedia Commons (under CC BY-SA 4.0)
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.
