Polish politicians in the infamous US report. Przemysław Czarnek thunders

The State Department's report on religious freedom in individual countries is published every year. Interestingly, the 2023 document includes a few names of Polish politicians.

The first recorded incident concerns Grzegorz Braun z Confederationa newly-baked MEP. The report recalled his scandalous statements towards religious minorities, and also recalled that in December 2023 he set off a fire extinguisher in the Sejm, to blow out the Hanukkah candles. It was noted that the authorities condemned the behavior of the far-right politician.

Braun was also mentioned in the report in the context of researcher's performance Holocaust Professor Jan Grabowski, whose speech was delivered by the politician of the Confederation disturbed.

In one of the following paragraphs we also read about reports of xenophobic statements by politicians from the Confederation or PiS. One of the examples is the statement of a former MP Janusz Korwin-Mikkewho stated in a post on the X website that he “does not understand the problem of the French with immigrants”. “We should distribute weapons to white heterosexual French people and pass an amnesty and a bonus for anyone who shoots a bandit, robber, thief in the act… And announce it in Arabic too. After an hour there will be peace” wrote Korwin-Mikke.

The report also features a character Robert Bąkiewicz and associations independence march and the Independence March Rota. These organizations, “considered anti-Semitic”, were mentioned because of subsidies from the Ministry of Culture. Bąkiewicz himself was written about because of an allegedly anti-Semitic statement on the Media Narodowe channel.

In the State Department document we also read about former prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki. This one appears because of criticism by researcher Prof. Barbara Engelkingwho spoke in an interview about the scale of help that Poles provided to Jews during the war.

For the same reason, the name of the former head of the Ministry of National Education appears in the report. Przemysław Czarnek. The politician has already addressed it online.

“How to defend Poland's good name against the shameful attacks of people like Engelking, when one talks about the heroism of millions of Poles during World War II and saving Jews at the cost of the lives of entire Polish families, an example of which are the Blessed Ulmas, one is… 'a threat to religious freedom'” – Czarnek wrote.

“Attention, geniuses – authors report from the US Department of State and others similarly unwise: Well, I am and will be such a threat. Because Poland is Poland and you will never allow yourself to be offended by the Engelkings or their like,” Czarnek concluded.

Another minister from the PiS government mentioned in the report is Piotr Glinski. The former head of the Ministry of Culture was included in the text due to award presented to the publicist. This concerns Rafał Ziemkiewicz, who “according to the Simon Wiesenthal Center, has posted anti-Semitic comments in the past on social media, in his books and in recordings.”

The US Department of State also mentions the Deputy Speaker of the Sejm in its report. Krzysztof Bosak for the statement in which he denied existence of Islamophobia. The document also includes the names of those associated with the Confederation Ryszard Zdzisław Zajączkowski.

The report also noted statements by politicians condemning words and behaviors that attack religious freedomincluding those who had previously been named in the report due to controversial wording. “On April 18, the then prime minister paid tribute to the thousands of Jews from the Warsaw ghetto murdered by Nazi Germany,” we read.

The authors of the document also discuss in detail the acts of vandalism, attacks on Catholic priests and other crimes motivated by racism or xenophobia recorded in Poland last year.

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