Poland has charged three of its own citizens with working on behalf of Russian intelligence. They are accused of spreading disinformation, conducting reconnaissance of NATO troops, and undergoing firearms training in order to prepare for acts of sabotage.

On Wednesday morning, the National Prosecutor’s Office announced that charges had been brought against the trio, who were named only by their initials: AĆ (aged 62), DC (aged 50) and AP (aged 48). They were detained on 12 May by Poland’s Internal Security Agency (ABW).

“The suspects’ activities were aimed at providing propaganda support for Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, as well as actively engaging in fundraising for the purchase of equipment for the Russian military,” wrote the prosecutor’s office.

“The detainees also performed a number of intelligence-gathering tasks commissioned by an identified Russian citizen associated with Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), including reconnaissance of the location of NATO troops stationed in Poland,” they added.

Prosecutors also say that “members of the group underwent training in firearms and battlefield tactics, which constituted preparations for sabotage missions”.

The spokesman for the National Prosecutor’s Office, Przemysław Nowak, told a press conference later on Wednesday that “the suspects belonged to an informal pro-Russian paramilitary organisation”, reports news website Wirtualna Polska.

The trio have been charged under sections of Poland’s espionage law carrying a minimum sentence of eight years in prison, ranging up to life. After being charged and questioned, all three pleaded not guilty. A court has agreed to a request from prosecutors to place the suspects in pretrial detention.​ 

Poland has in recent years been a primary target for Russia’s so-called “hybrid actions”, which include acts of sabotage, disinformation and cyberattacks, as well as espionage.

A report earlier this year by the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism identified Poland as “the most frequently targeted country” in Europe for acts of sabotage orchestrated by Russia.

Earlier this month, the ABW released figures showing that it launched twice as many espionage investigations in 2025 as in 2024. Over those two years combined, there were more investigations than across the previous three decades.

Moscow often carries out such actions not through traditional agents trained at home and sent abroad to conduct missions, but through people already on the ground, often amateurs hired through online messaging service Telegram and paid in cryptocurrencies.

Many such “disposable agents”, as they are often called, come from Poland’s large Ukrainian and Belarusian migrant communities. But some others have been Poles, motivated either by the money on offer or in some cases by ideological sympathies with Russia.

Last October, Polish prosecutors indicted a former employee of Warsaw city hall accused of spying for Russia. In February, a 29-year-old Polish man was indicted on suspicion of passing on information about Polish and NATO infrastructure to Russian intelligence.

Last month, prosecutors charged a soldier from Poland’s Territorial Defence Force with espionage. The suspect was reportedly active in a pro-Russian, anti-Ukrainian far-right group.

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.

New Hungarian Prime Minister Péter Magyar has visited Poland on his first foreign trip since taking office. Speaking alongside Polish counterpart Donald Tusk, he declared that his government can “learn from Poland” on restoring the rule of law, recovering frozen EU funds, and fighting corruption.

Tusk, meanwhile, hailed Magyar’s “historic victory”, which he said marked “Hungary’s return to Europe” after years of “problematic” rule by Viktor Orbán.

After Magyar won his landslide election victory in April, he confirmed that his first foreign trip as prime minister would be to Poland, which has longstanding ties with Hungary and where Tusk’s centrist, pro-EU government is closely aligned with Magyar’s Tisza party.

Unusually for a visiting foreign leader, Magyar first visited Kraków, Poland’s second-largest city, which was, in the second half of the 19th century and up to 1918, part of the Austro-Hungarian empire. There, he visited a number of historical sites connected to Hungary.

Magyar subsequently travelled to Warsaw by train, saying that this gave him an “opportunity to show Hungarians what infrastructure investments have been made” with the support of EU funds.

“Unfortunately, in Hungary over the last 20 years, we haven’t experienced this,” he added, referring to the record of Orbán’s former government.

On Wednesday morning, Magyar met with Tusk, after which the pair spoke at a joint press conference. The Polish prime minister, who also met with Magyar during his election campaign, welcomed his counterpart’s victory.

“It is a sign of hope for millions of people in Europe and around the world that democracy, the rule of law, decency and morality in politics are not lost causes,” declared Tusk, likening it to when his own coalition unseated the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) government, an Orbán ally, in 2023.

Tusk said that Poland and Hungary would now be able to “act as one, both in Brussels, on geopolitical matters, and in pursuing various common interests”.

Both he and Magyar indicated the Visegrad Group – a regional forum comprising Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, which has been largely moribund in recent years – could now be “renewed and revitalised”, in Tusk’s words.

This, in turn, would help strengthen the region’s voice in the European Union, “to make Europe more like us, because we have a lot to offer Europe”, said the Polish prime minister.

“The heart of Europe beats in Central and Eastern Europe,” added Magyar, who said that he hoped to expand Visegrad’s cooperation to also include Nordic and Balkan countries, as well as Austria.

The Hungarian prime minister, who is being accompanied on his trip to Poland by six of his ministers, said that his government would seek to follow the example of Tusk in restoring the rule of law, recovering frozen EU funds, and fighting corruption.

“Poland is a bit ahead [of us],” said Magyar. “Poland is at the forefront of all these countries [in central Europe]…It is a regional power…I’m very much counting on the [Tusk’s] experience, on the experience of the Polish government, the Polish nation.”

Tusk, meanwhile, said that Poland is “ready to provide assistance” in helping Hungary wean itself off reliance on Russian energy, as Poland itself has done in recent years.

He also expressed hope that, with Magyar in power, it would be easier to “work on a common European position towards Ukraine”. Orbán, a close ally of Moscow, often prevented the EU from taking a common stance in support of Ukraine.

After meeting Tusk, Magyar headed for talks with Polish President Karol Nawrocki, who is aligned with PiS and controversially visited Orbán shortly before the Hungarian elections.

Nawrocki’s office revealed that the pair were due to discuss bilateral relations, regional security and cooperation, and Polish support for Hungary’s efforts to become independent of Russian energy. However, no joint press conference was scheduled.

Subsequently, Magyar will travel onwards to the city of Gdańsk on Poland’s northern Baltic coast, which is Tusk’s hometown. The two prime ministers will meet there with Lech Wałęsa, the former Polish president, anti-communist leader, and Nobel Peace Prize winner.

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.

Wrocław has become the second Polish city to recognise a same-sex marriage conducted abroad, following the example of Warsaw, which last week began transcribing such marriages into its civil registry in line with European and Polish court orders.

“This long-awaited change has become a fact,” celebrated Alina Szeptycka, Wrocław’s plenipotentiary for equal treatment. “After many years, and recently also months of intense struggle, same-sex marriages concluded abroad are also marriages under Polish law.”

However, given that Polish law still does not allow for any form of same-sex union to be formed domestically, it remains unclear what the legal consequences of recognising such marriages conducted abroad will be.

The couple in question are Ryszard Ziobro and Tomasz Kwietko-Bębnowski (pictured above), who have been together for almost 50 years. After marrying in Austria last year, they returned to Wrocław and filed a request to transcribe their marriage into the local registry.

Up until this year, registry offices and courts in Poland have rejected such requests, often pointing to the article of Poland’s constitution that says: “Marriage, being a union of a man and a woman, as well as the family, motherhood and parenthood, shall be placed under the protection and care of the Republic of Poland.”

However, last November, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ruled that Poland must recognise same-sex marriages conducted in other EU member states.

That led Poland’s Supreme Administrative Court (NSA) in March to order the Warsaw registry office to transcribe the marriage certificate of another Polish couple, Jakub Cupriak-Trojan and Mateusz Trojan, who fought a long legal battle to have their marriage, which took place in Germany, recognised in Poland. 

Last week, Warsaw’s mayor, Rafał Trzaskowski, announced that the city had complied with the NSA order and transcribed the Cupriak-Trojan’s marriage certificate. He pledged that it would do the same for other same-sex Polish couples who have married in EU member states.

Unlike the Cupriak-Trojans and many other same-sex couples seeking to have their marriages recognised, Ziobro and Kwietko-Bębnowski did not go to court. Instead, they waited for Wrocław, which was keen to recognise their marriage, to be formally able to do so.

The city asked the interior ministry to issue a regulation introducing the necessary changes to the registry system to allow same-sex marriages to be entered into the system. Currently, it only recognises male-female marriages.

However, after Warsaw decided last week to recognise a same-sex marriage despite the government not changing the system, Wrocław has now followed suit.

Wrocław’s decision marks the first time a same-sex marriage has been recognised in Poland without a court order.

“This shows that the historic judgments of the Court of Justice of the European Union and Polish courts are beginning to truly change the reality for same-sex couples in Poland,” wrote Replika, a magazine covering LGBT+ issues.

It also indicates that Warsaw’s groundbreaking decision will prompt other places, especially more liberal larger cities, to do the same. Many have already made clear they wish to do so.

However, given the lack of recognition of same-sex relationships in Polish law, it remains unclear what the legal effects of transcription will be.

Speaking to Polsat News last week, interior minister Marcin Kierwiński confirmed that the transcription of marriage certificates “does not mean that marriages concluded abroad will have each and every right” available to other married couples.

The government is also working on changes to the registry system to allow same-sex couples to be more easily entered.

Last week, digital affairs minister Krzysztof Gawkowski, whose department is responsible for the civil registry system, announced that he had signed a draft regulation that would amend marriage certificates to allow recognition of same-sex marriages conducted abroad.

The regulation must also be approved by the interior ministry, and Kierwiński has pledged to do so “quickly”.

Their rush to action came in the wake of an order from Prime Minister Donald Tusk, who last week apologised to same-sex couples for the “years of rejection and humiliation” they have experienced due to Poland not legally recognising their relationships.

However, more significant moves to expand LGBT+ rights in Poland – such as allowing same-sex unions to be formed domestically – would require not just new regulations, which can be issued unilaterally by the government, but changes to legislation, which require the approval of parliament and the president.

Tusk’s ruling coalition, which ranges from left to centre right, has a parliamentary majority but includes conservative elements that have expressed reluctance towards expanding LGBT+ rights.

Even if parliamentary approval is obtained, President Karol Nawrocki, who is aligned with the right-wing opposition and regularly clashes with the government, is almost certain to veto any such bills.

Olivier Sorgho

Olivier Sorgho is senior editor at Notes from Poland, covering politics, business and society. He previously worked for Reuters.

We started this project to bring federalism to this city, which is very important for European integration. If you want to help and support us, follow us <3

Abbiamo avviato questo progetto per portare il federalismo anche in questa realtà cittadina molto importante per l'integrazione europea, se volete aiutarci e supportarci, seguiteci <3

##What's the news?

• Soon after taking over the European People’s Party, President Manfred Weber and Secretary General Thanasis Bakolas hired two one-man consultancies with ties to Greece’s governing party.
• The consultants were paid over half a million euros in six months time, payment information obtained by Follow the Money shows.
• The European Parliament refused to reimburse the amounts but did not escalate the case for further investigation.

##Why does this matter?

• Weber is considered to be the EU’s most powerful politician. Under his watch, the EPP spent a large part of its reserves on consultants who other staff members say brought limited added value.
• The affair raises questions about the effectiveness of oversight over how European political parties spend their money.

---

Here's a full copy of the article.

• Pro-Orban media sees leadership changes, programme cuts
• Incoming PM Peter Magyar pledges new media law and restoration of press freedom
• Analysts warn reforms in public service media depend on political will
• Pro-Orban conglomerate faces loss of state advertising revenue

The media empire built by former Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's government, a key pillar of the nationalist leader's 16 years in power, is swiftly unravelling following an election last month ​that abruptly ended his rule.

Within weeks of the vote, which the centre-right opposition led by Peter Magyar won with a landslide, senior figures at some of the most prominent pro-Orban ‌outlets have been pushed out and a flagship news programme was scrapped.

The tone of public service media changed overnight, with more opposition voices appearing even before Magyar formally took power, while pro-Orban influencers have practically disappeared from social media.

Magyar, who called public service media a "factory of lies", has pledged to restore press freedom, create a new media law and a new ​media authority.

Leaders of ⁠the European Union are closely watching Hungary as a test case for restoring democratic checks and balances - media freedom was one of the key rule-of-law issues over which Orban's government often clashed with Brussels.

Under Orban, state ​media came under increasing government control as new media laws were enacted, and several private outlets were either shut down or taken over by pro-government businessmen. ungary fell to 74th place in 2026 from 23rd in 2010 in Reporters Without Borders’ ​press freedom index.

The nickname of my city, Antwerp ( Belgium ) is: de Koekestad. Wich means : the city of cookies. It was because of the many cookie factories in the past.

PS Dont forget to tell also the real name of your city !

An upvote is appreciated!

Police in Poland have detained five people, all Polish citizens in their teens, on suspicion of involvement in a violent attack on a group of Ukrainian teenagers in Warsaw last week.

In the wake of the incident, the city’s liberal mayor, Rafał Trzaskowski, blamed the anti-Ukrainian rhetoric of right-wing politicians for “encouraging thugs” to carry out these kinds of attacks.

The attack took place on Thursday last week on Warsaw’s Świętokrzyski Bridge, with police saying that three Ukrainian teenagers were assaulted, one of whom required hospital treatment.

Gazeta Wyborcza, a leading daily, spoke with the hospitalised victim, whom they named only as Artem. He said that he and a group of friends, who had been speaking in Ukrainian and Russian, were attacked by a group of around ten Poles.

Artem was sprayed with pepper spray and beaten, resulting in a fractured skull. He says that the assailants tried to throw one of his friends off the bridge and shouted, “Fuck off back to Ukraine”. The incident was only brought to an end because a police car appeared, resulting in the attackers fleeing.

In an initial statement on Monday, local police said that “the current findings and evidence collected so far do not indicate that this incident was motivated by nationality”.

However, on Wednesday, Trzaskowski told a press conference that “everything indicates that this was a crime motivated by nationality and even racism”. The mayor said he was “incredibly saddened” that this had happened. “We often say that Warsaw is a tolerant and safe city.”

Trzaskowski issued a message to those who he believes are responsible for stirring hate towards Ukrainians.

“Your words – and I’m addressing right-wing politicians in particular – sometimes have precisely this kind of consequences,” said the mayor. “Verbal attacks on our guests from Ukraine can, unfortunately, be perceived by thugs as an encouragement to carry out this type of behaviour, and can end this way.”

The mayor also warned that such rhetoric and incidents serve the interests of Russia, which has long tried to stir animosity between Poles and Ukrainians.

“I think no one enjoys these kinds of incidents more than Moscow and Russian propaganda, which constantly tries to divide us from Ukrainians and incite Polish society against our Ukrainian guests,” said Trzaskowski.

Ukrainians are by far Poland’s largest foreign national group. The country is home to almost one million refugees who fled Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as well as hundreds of thousands of other Ukrainian immigrants.

However, far-right groups have led a growing campaign against the large-scale presence of Ukrainians, which they say threatens Poland’s identity and also makes it harder for Poles to access housing, healthcare, education and other services.

In a social media post on Thursday, interior minister Marcin Kierwiński announced that “the police have detained five individuals, Polish citizens aged 15-18”, on suspicion of carrying out the attack on Świętokrzyski Bridge.

“Zero tolerance for aggression,” wrote Kierwiński, who also shared a video of the suspects being arrested.

In a further statement quoted by broadcaster RMF, the police said that “procedural activities are underway to thoroughly clarify all the circumstances of the incident and determine the role played by each of the young men”.

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.

Swedish defence giant Saab has signed a strategic collaboration agreement with Polish state defence group PGZ that will see them cooperate on naval production, servicing and technology.

The firms say that PGZ will be integrated into Saab’s supply chain, while they also aim to establish an underwater technology centre in Poland and explore joint production projects, including for a new torpedo.

The deal highlights and reinforces the growing ties between Poland and Sweden, two Baltic NATO allies that signed a strategic partnership in 2024 to enhance cooperation on defence and economic development.

Poland last year picked Saab as its preferred supplier of three new submarines for its navy. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said at the time that one reason Saab won the bid was its openness to invest in and transfer expertise to the Polish shipbuilding industry.

In March this year, Saab and PGZ agreed to cooperate on the maintenance and repair of those submarines. Under the new agreement signed this week, the pair will also collaborate more broadly on the servicing of surface and underwater vessels.

The Swedish company also says it will “integrate PGZ Group’s naval domain entities into Saab’s supply chain” while “pursuing selected export opportunities for both surface and underwater platforms, including rescue vessels”.

Additionally, the firms intend to establish an “underwater technology centre” in Poland and “explore the possibility to collaborate on a heavyweight torpedo”, says Saab.

Saab’s CEO, Micael Johansson, expressed satisfaction at the “speed at which our cooperation is advancing”.

He said that the new agreement “reflects a strong commitment to a deepening partnership between Polish and Swedish industry, while also contributing to enhanced security in the Baltic Sea and NATO’s eastern flank”.

His counterpart at PGZ, Adam Leszkiewicz, likewise hailed the deal as “an important step in the development of maritime competences in Poland and integration with international supply chains”.

“Maritime and submarine domains are becoming a key pillar of Polish-Swedish cooperation, from both a security and industrial perspective,” he added.

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Poland has increased its defence spending to the highest relative level in NATO. While Warsaw still buys much of its hardware abroad, in particular from the US and South Korea, it has also been seeking to bolster its domestic defence industry.

Meanwhile, Poland has in recent years sought to build closer ties across the Baltic region, helped by the fact that Finland and Sweden joined NATO after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Last year, Poland and Sweden held their first bilateral military exercises in the Baltic Sea and Sweden bought €274 million worth of Piorun man-portable air-defence systems from Polish firm Mesko, a subsidiary of PGZ.

Poland has also deepened defence ties with Norway, whose Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace will be involved in developing a new Polish anti-drone system. Meanwhile, Poland will manufacture missiles for K239 Chunmoo rocket artillery systems that Norway is purchasing from South Korea.

Olivier Sorgho

Olivier Sorgho is senior editor at Notes from Poland, covering politics, business and society. He previously worked for Reuters.

Forty-six nations in Europe and beyond agreed Friday on a new interpretation of the European Convention on Human Rights in migration cases, including how it applied to the controversial use of deportation centers set up in third countries.

The political declaration came after calls from some member states for stricter approaches to fight irregular migration and facilitate deportations.

Rights groups criticized the political declaration, saying it could loosen prohibitions on torture and weaken Europe’s human rights protections for migrants.

“The declaration underlines that states have the undeniable sovereign right to control the entry and residence of foreign nationals, and that it is both an obligation and a necessity for states to protect their borders in compliance with the Convention,” the Council of Europe said in a statement after the non-binding declaration was adopted all of its 46 members’ foreign ministers Friday at a meeting in Chisinau, the Moldovan capital.

It said that nations “exposed to mass arrivals” can pursue new approaches to deter irregular migration including “third country ‘return hubs’, and cooperation with countries of transit.”

The Council oversees the European Court of Human Rights, the top court that protects the continent’s human rights convention.

The declaration could weaken both the court and convention, said Chiara Catelli, a spokesperson for the Brussels-based rights group PICUM.

“Governments are effectively seeking to pressure an independent Court into weakening long-established human rights protections in order to facilitate deportations, with the risk of deporting people where they could face torture, inhuman or degrading treatment, or where they would stop receiving life-saving medical care,” she said.

“A two-tier human rights system based on migration status is an affront to the basic principle that human rights are universal,” said Eve Geddie, director of Amnesty International’s European Institutions Office.

##See also:

• UK joins European deal to send rejected asylum seekers to third-country hubs • All 46 Council of Europe members sign agreement ‘deplored’ by human rights organisations (The Guardian)

The German housing market crisis is deepening social inequality. Newcomers in particular are struggling to find affordable housing — with consequences for integration, education, and the labor market.

Finding a rental apartment with three or four rooms in Berlin? No problem for top earners. In May 2026, a major rental platform is listing a unit of just over 100 square meters (1,076 square feet) for just over €4,000 ($4,680) per month, including heating and other additional costs. The lowest offer is just under €1,000 for 80 square meters — but that unit requires renovations and is located on the outskirts of the city.

Renters are currently finding it almost impossible to find an attractive and affordable apartment in a good location in large parts of Germany. This is especially true in both metropolitan areas and in economically strong rural regions.

Across the nation, there's a shortage of around 1.4 million apartments in the lower and middle price ranges, and this limited availability, combined with high demand, is driving prices up.

More than half of Germany's population lives in rental housing. Tenant‑protection laws safeguard existing contracts relatively well, but the situation is different for new rentals. According to the latest annual report by the Expert Council on Integration and Migration (SVR), immigrants and people of immigrant background are disproportionately disadvantaged in this process.

Newcomers often live in smaller — and frequently overcrowded — apartments, and they are far less likely to be homeowners. More than 50% of people with no migration history live in owner-occupied housing, compared with less than 33% of those with one. Newcomers to Germany also have to devote a larger share of their income to rent.

These challenges are compounded by structural disadvantages: Lower incomes and larger household sizes are key factors. But migration‑specific hurdles also play a role, as insecure residency status, weak social networks, and language barriers make finding housing even harder. Refugees in particular tend to move into socially disadvantaged neighborhoods, where rents tend to be lower or where support networks might already exist.

At the same time, many asylum-seekers remain in state-run accommodations for lack of alternatives — even though they are legally permitted to move out. Discrimination is another disadvantage people with a migration history face in the housing market, said deputy SVR chair Birgit Glorius: "Including racial discrimination, as studies have shown."

Poland granted citizenship to a record 19,135 people in 2025, up by 17% from the previous year and almost five times higher than a decade ago. Over half of recipients, 10,295, were Ukrainians, who make up Poland’s largest immigrant group.

The number of foreigners gaining Polish citizenship has risen steadily in recent years amid record levels of immigration. However, the government is currently working on legislation that would make it more difficult to obtain citizenship.

The new data, which come from the interior ministry, do not include people claiming citizenship through Polish descent. Under Polish law, such individuals are not granted citizenship, but simply have it confirmed. However, other foreigners can still obtain it in two main ways.

The most common route is for candidates to apply to the governor of the province where they reside. They must demonstrate stable income, housing and Polish language skills, while meeting the requirement for minimum length of residency.

For most applicants, that period is three years of permanent, continuous residence. However, it is shorter in certain cases, for example for spouses of Polish citizens or for holders of the so-called Pole’s Card (Karta Polaka), which is mainly granted to ethnic Poles from former Soviet states.

The second option is to apply directly to the president for citizenship. This route does not have a requirement for a certain period of residency; decisions are simply at the discretion of the president. But applicants must present their personal histories and reasons for seeking citizenship, alongside proof of ties to the country.

After Ukrainians, the largest national groups granted Polish citizenship last year were Belarusians (6,519), Russians (763), Vietnamese (497) and Turks (116).

Last year, the interior ministry presented plans to toughen the rules for obtaining Polish citizenship. They would increase the minimum residency period for most people from three to eight years and require applicants to take a test proving they are integrated and sign a declaration of loyalty.

The government also wants all of the new measures to apply not only to people who go through the normal application route, but also to those who take the option of applying directly to the president, who currently has discretion to issue citizenship without the usual criteria.

However, the plans have not been put to parliament, with the ministry announcing last week that it was still “working on the changes”.

“Citizenship will be treated as an earned privilege, not a formal certificate,” said the ministry, which pledged to put an end to “automatism” in granting citizenship and to avoid the “mistakes of other countries”.

In response to the new citizenship figures for 2025, Krzysztof Bosak, one of the leaders of the far-right opposition Confederation (Konfederacja) group, called them “another inglorious record” that reveal a “dangerous situation”.

“Poland has extremely liberal criteria for granting citizenship…probably everyone from right to left agrees that tightening them is necessary,” he wrote on X, also accusing Prime Minister Donald Tusk of “torpedoing” various proposed reforms.

Poland’s main opposition party, the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS), in October proposed its own bill that would, among other things, have raised the residency requirement to ten years and impose even stricter linguistic demands. However, the proposal was rejected by parliament in January.

Opposition-aligned President Karol Nawrocki last September also proposed his own bill to toughen citizenship requirements, including by increasing residency requirements to ten years.

Poland has over the last decade experienced levels of immigration unprecedented in the country’s history and among the highest in the EU.

For six years running, between 2017 and 2022, when PiS was in power, it issued more first residence permits to immigrants from outside the European Union than did any other member state. Tusk’s government has sought to introduce tougher migration controls, resulting in falling numbers of new arrivals.

Last month, government figures showed that the number of foreigners with residence permits in Poland has reached two million, making up just over 5% of the country’s population.

Over three quarters of those are Ukrainians (1.55 million), with the next largest groups being Belarusians (139,300), Indians (26,100), Georgians (22,200), Russians (19,500), Vietnamese (15,100) and Turks (14,500).

Olivier Sorgho

Olivier Sorgho is senior editor at Notes from Poland, covering politics, business and society. He previously worked for Reuters.

Two leading NGOs, Amnesty International and Human Rights First, have urged Poland to stop helping the US deport people to Ukraine through Polish airports and territory. They say that sending people into a war zone is a violation of international law.

According to the NGOs’ findings, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) conducted two operations – one in November 2025, the other in March 2026 – to send over 50 people to Ukraine through Poland.

That prompted Amnesty and Human Rights First to send a letter to Poland’s foreign and interior ministers about the issue in mid-April, since when a further ICE flight containing an unknown number of people being sent to Ukraine landed at Rzeszów Jasionka Airport.

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Poland has become the primary hub for people and equipment going in and out of Ukraine.

“Poland has stood by Ukraine’s side since Russia began its war of aggression, providing temporary protection to nearly 1 million Ukrainian refugees,” noted Anna Błaszczak-Banasiak, director of Amnesty International Poland.

The fact that Poland is now involved in “forcibly transferring Ukrainians into an active war zone, where missiles strike nationwide, shocks the conscience and violates international law”, added Uzra Zeya, CEO of Human Rights First.

“Poland should play no role in these unlawful operations that rip families apart, divide communities and put people’s lives at risk,” she added. The NGOs note that, under international law, Poland has an obligation not to expel or return people to places where their lives or freedom could be at risk.

Amnesty and Human Rights First pointed to a report in March by CNN, which spoke to some of those who had been on the deportation flights.

“The group was flown to Poland and transported to the Ukrainian border by US officials who then handed them over to Polish officials who escorted them across the border,” wrote CNN.

It noted the case of one deportee who had entered the US legally with his partner under the Biden-era Uniting for Ukraine humanitarian programme. While his partner had her stay extended once the initial two-year term expired, his application remained “pending” for over a year before he was arrested by ICE and deported.

Amnesty and Human Rights First addressed the issue in a letter to Polish foreign minister Radosław Sikorski and interior minister Marcin Kierwiński on 17 April.

They warned that “forcibly sending individuals to an active war zone violates the[ir] rights” and “urged your government to uphold its international commitments to uphold non-refoulement and to reject the Trump administration’s cruel and inhumane mass removal campaign”.

Non-refoulement is a principle of international law prohibiting the deportation of people to a country where there life or freedom is threatened.

As the Polish authorities have not responded to the letter, the NGOs have now decided to make it public. The Polish government has so far made no public comment on the issue.

Poland itself has since last year stepped up deportations of foreigners who are in Poland unlawfully or have committed other crimes while in the country.

In 2025, Poland forcibly removed just over 2,100 foreigners, almost twice as many as in the previous year. Over half of the deportees, 1,150 of them, were Ukrainians, who are by far Poland’s largest immigrant group.

In one high-profile incident last year, the Polish authorities sought to deport 57 Ukrainians and six Belarusians involved in criminal behaviour at a concert in Warsaw’s National Stadium by Belarusian rapper Max Korzh.

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.

Why is Russia banned from participating in the Eurovision Song Contest for waging war, while Israel faces no sanctions regardless of its actions? How do Europeans view this reality?