Polish PM sacks key ministers in move to mend EU ties

WARSAW: Poland´s new right-wing Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki sacked his defence and foreign ministers in a major cabinet reshuffle on Tuesday, as he seeks to mend strained ties with the country´s EU partners.

The prime minister was due in Brussels on Tuesday for talks with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, focused on the EU´s unprecedented disciplinary procedure against Warsaw over its controversial judicial reforms, which Brussels says threaten the rule of law.

Ahead of his departure, it was announced that defence minister Antoni Macierewicz and foreign minister Witold Waszczykowski lost their jobs along with environment minister Jan Szyszko, among others, at an official ceremony held at the presidential palace in Warsaw. Interior minister Mariusz Blaszczak took over the defence portfolio, while Jacek Czaputowicz, a deputy foreign minister with centrist views, will serve as foreign minister.

"We don´t want to be a dogmatic, doctrinaire or extremist government; we want to be a government that draws together the economy and society, as well as the European and global dimensions with the local level," Morawiecki, who himself took office just last month, said as he greeted his new cabinet. Warsaw-based political analyst Eryk Mystewicz described the reshuffle as "a new opening with the EU that gives a strong signal to Europe."

"Morawiecki, Czaputowicz are not people who can be accused of wanting a Polexit," Mystewicz said, adding that Czaputowicz as foreign minister "is a man from the centre who can give a new impetus to relations between Warsaw and Brussels."

In a major escalation against one of the bloc´s biggest states, Brussels last month triggered article seven of the EU treaty over what it sees as "systemic threats" to the independence of the Polish judiciary from the nation´s right-wing government.

Never before used against an EU member state, the proceedings can eventually lead to the "nuclear option" of the suspension of a country´s voting rights within the bloc. The EU gave Warsaw three months to remedy the situation, saying it could withdraw the measures if it did. But just hours after the EU announcement, a defiant Polish president went ahead and signed the reforms into law and accused the bloc of "lying" about them. Poland insists the reforms are aimed at banishing the last vestiges of communism from its justice system.