Poland to react 'quickly' to Russian disinformation before presidential election
hw/rl
05.04.2025, 16:54
Poland's Minister of Interior Tomasz Siemoniak. (PAP/Łukasz Gągulski)
podpis źródła zdjęcia
Poland is ready to react “quickly” to Russian disinformation campaigns and “destabilization” efforts in the run up to the presidential elections next month, the interior minister has said.
Earlier this week, senior ministers blamed Russia and Belarus for “planned and well-organized" cyberattacks against Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s Civic Platform party. The technology minister warned that Russia was looking to impact the vote on May 18.
Minister of Interior Tomasz Siemoniak told Swedish newspaper “Dagens Nyheter” in an interview published on Saturday that the state is ready to act if similar incidents are carried out.
"Poland is preparing to react quickly to disinformation, especially on the Internet," he stressed.
The minister highlighted last years’ hack on a Polish Press Agency PAP's website which published a fake article saying Tusk had announced the mobilization and sending of Polish soldiers to Ukraine.
“Someone managed to hack into the PAP website and spread information that could arouse strong emotions. We must be ready before the (presidential) elections, especially in matters related to Ukraine," Siemoniak said.
Several European nations have accused Russia of interfering in the democratic process, with Moscow being blamed for meddling in the presidential elections held in Moldova and Romania last year.
The accusations led to the Romanian ballot being annulled, prompting a political crisis in the country.
Siemoniak also listed several ways other ways Russia could seek to destabilize the country, such as sabotage and attempts to create tensions between Poles and Ukrainians living in Poland.
The minister called the situation on the Belarusian Polish border a form of destabilization where people are being used as “weapons.” Since 2021, migrants, mostly from the middle east and Africa, have been directed to illegally cross the border often aided by the Belarusian security forces.
“It is not Belarusians who are fleeing from dictatorship, but people who fly to Moscow and pay big money for it," he explained.
In recent days, there has been an uptick in the number of attempted illegally crossings, the Interior Ministry has said.
On May 18, first round of the presidential election will be held in Poland which will chose a successor to Andrzej Duda, who cannot run again after two successive terms.
Tusk’s PO party, under the wider banner of the Civic Coalition (KO), is the dominant force in Poland’s ruling coalition, which includes parties from the center-left and center-right of the political spectrum.
KO’s candidate for the presidency, Warsaw Mayor Rafał Trzaskowski, has a healthy lead in the opinion polls for the first round of voting.
He will likely face historian Karol Nawrocki, backed by the conservative opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party, in a run-off. However, the far-right Konfederacja’s Sławomir Mentzen is polling strongly in third place.
