May 7, Pozirk. Belarusian secret services worked much longer than “a few months” to recruit Tomasz Szmydt, the Polish judge who fled to Belarus last week, Onet.pl reported citing Prime Minister Donald Tusk.
The judge was of interest to spy agencies because he had access to the justice minister and “information that not a single secret service can access,” he said.
The prime minister urged the public to be aware of “the tension, created by the presence of foreign services in connection with the war” and “not to have illusions about the nature of actions by some people seeking to destroy the Polish justice system.”
Szmydt has submitted an unofficial asylum request in Belarus, says a Russian-language Telegram channel created four days ago.
Szmydt said he was forced to leave Poland because of disagreement with the government’s policy. He claimed that he “was persecuted and threatened for his independent political position.”
The Pole asked Alaksandar Łukašenka for protection and announced his resignation at a press conference hosted by BelTA, a state-run news agency in Minsk.
In 2019, Szmydt and his wife were reportedly involved in a smear campaign targeting judges who opposed judicial reforms by the Law and Justice (PiS) government that was in power in Poland at that time.
Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski told tvn24.pl that he was “shocked” by Szmydt’s defection.
In 2021, Emil Czeczko, a Polish soldier fled to Belarus amid the migrant crisis. In televised interviews, he accused Polish border guards of committing atrocities.
In 2022, Czeczko was found hanged at a Minsk apartment.
Relations between Belarus and Poland are currently at a low point with tension persisting over the political persecution of ethnic Poles in Belarus, Minsk’s alleged role in facilitating illegal migration from Asia and Africa into Poland, Łukašenka’s anti-Polish rhetoric and support for the Russian war against Ukraine.
