Ottawa criticized for silence on Poland’s controversial laws as Trudeau welcomes PM – National | 24CA News
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is welcoming Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki to Canada Friday because the federal Liberals preserve quiet a couple of democratic backslide in his nation.
“There is too much silence, and I think we are on the edge in Poland,” mentioned Marcin Gabrys, a political scientist with Jagiellonian University in Krakow.
“How can you have a shared commitment to democracy when there is a clear threat to the electoral process?”
Gabrys, who makes a speciality of Canadian research, mentioned Canada and Poland have been enterprise an unprecedented quantity of collaboration for the reason that ruling Law and Justice celebration, domestically often called PiS, took energy in 2015.
Yet the celebration has “a strong discrepancy” with the values held by the Trudeau authorities, he mentioned.
For instance, a brand new regulation in Poland will create a fee to probe alleged Russian interference within the nation. Academics and civil-rights teams say the mandate is so obscure that the panel of largely authorities MPs shall be used to assault opposition events.
“It threatens, for sure, not only the electoral process but also academic freedom, because the commission has such large powers to question people from academia,” Gabrys mentioned.
On Monday, the U.S. State Department expressed concern over a brand new regulation “that could be misused to interfere with Poland’s free and fair elections.”
Gabrys was stunned that on that very same day, Trudeau introduced Morawiecki’s go to by praising “a shared commitment to NATO and democracy.”
On Tuesday, a Polish MP from the far-right Confederation celebration blocked University of Ottawa professor Jan Grabowski from delivering a lecture in Warsaw that might have touched on Polish complicity in crimes throughout the Holocaust.
The subject is a sore level for PiS, which in 2018 outlawed truthful statements that some Poles have been complicit in Nazi struggle crimes.
“This timing doesn’t serve the social agenda of the Trudeau government,” Gabrys mentioned.
Two years in the past, Morawiecki’s authorities restricted abortions to circumstances the place a being pregnant resulted from a legal act or posed a critical well being threat. The celebration has known as out LGBTQ rights as “an attack on the family and children” and turned a blind eye to municipalities and areas declaring themselves “LGBT-free zones.”
Gabrys expects Trudeau will keep away from speaking about any of these points whereas Morawiecki is within the nation.
“For Canada, many times the economic interest and security interests are more important. And sometimes it means that Ottawa has abstained from saying what it should say. Nevertheless, the case in Poland is so clear; it has been for so many years. And I didn’t see any reaction from Canada,” he mentioned.
Canada and Poland have been ramping up navy collaboration since Russia’s 2014 invasion of Ukraine.
That ranks excessive in Trudeau’s official discover about Morawiecki’s go to, which pledges “to address the regional defence and security challenges resulting from Russia’s brutal and unjustifiable war of aggression.”
Poland has been among the many most assertive European international locations in urging navy allies to offer Ukraine with tools. Gabrys says that’s partly as a consequence of a conviction {that a} victorious Russia would really feel emboldened to focus on Poland and the three Baltic international locations.
He’s watching to see if Poland makes a request for Canadians to coach European troopers in specialty tools or in winter situations, or to station extra Canadian troopers within the area. Gabrys expects Morawiecki to reward Canada for resettling Ukrainians who fled to Poland final yr and for funding initiatives to assist combine these staying in that nation.
Trade between Canada and Poland has been booming, rising 52 per cent within the 5 years for the reason that Canada-EU commerce deal got here into impact, regardless that Warsaw hasn’t totally ratified the deal.
Poland recovered quicker from the 2008 international recession, the European debt disaster and the COVID-19 pandemic than most of its friends.
The nation is seeking to Canada for know-how in carbon-capture expertise and the fledgling nuclear area of small modular reactors.
Gabrys mentioned his nation can be open to Canadian hydrogen, uranium and liquefied pure fuel if there’s sufficient of a business case, and Poland is making an attempt to grow to be a hub for electrical-vehicle battery factories.
He famous that Poland’s ambassador in Ottawa, Witold Dzielski, is near the PiS management and has a greater understanding of Canada than most envoys.
That has led to a collection of unprecedented visits, Gabrys mentioned, resembling when Polish Health Minister Adam Niedzielski visited Canada in March to take inventory of medical help for Ukrainians and to look at attainable collaboration in life sciences.
“I see a new chapter, a new energy in the relations between Poland and Canada,” Gabrys mentioned.
© 2023 The Canadian Press
