Polish prosecutors are opening an investigation into a judge who fled to autocratic Belarus

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Polish prosecutors opened an investigation Monday after a Polish judge fled to the autocratic state of Belarus and pleaded for protection.

The public prosecutor’s office said it was investigating the suspicion that the judge had acted on behalf of a foreign secret service. The Internal Security Agency launched a separate investigation into the extent of classified information to which the judge had access.

Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski called the judge a traitor and said the case was shocking.

According to Belarusian state media, Judge Tomasz Szmydt told reporters in the Belarusian capital Minsk that he was forced to leave Poland, a NATO and European Union country, due to disagreements with current authorities.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s pro-EU government took power in December, promising to restore democratic norms after eight years of rule by the right-wing Law and Justice party.

Law and Justice, which was in power from 2015 to 2023, implemented a series of changes to the justice system that gave the party more power over the courts and judicial authorities and undermined the democratic separation of powers. This led to a dispute with the EU, which the union only resolved on Monday.

Szmydt, a judge at the Voivodeship Administrative Court in Warsaw, gained notoriety in 2019 when he and his then-wife waged an online smear campaign against judges who criticized judicial changes made by Law and Justice.

Justice Minister Adam Bodnar said in an evening interview on private broadcaster TVN24 that he worked in the intelligence department and decided on various cases related to the granting of security clearances.

“We don’t know what information he had,” Bodnar said.

In a letter sent to the President of the Supreme Administrative Court in Warsaw, Szmydt announced that he was resigning from his post in protest “against the unfair and harmful policies of the authorities of the Republic of Poland towards the Republic of Belarus and the Republic of Belarus.” Russian Federation.”

The letter was published on the social media platform X in an account under the name “Szmydt Tomasz”. The profile only began posting messages on Monday and it was not clear whether the judge controlled the profile.

In a separate post, the report accused Polish authorities, who are strongly pro-Ukraine and pro-American, of “leading the country to war” – a message then highlighted by the Belarusian state news agency Belta.

In Minsk, Szmydt reportedly asked Belarus’ long-time leader Alexander Lukashenko for protection, saying he viewed Belarus as a “country with great potential” led by a “very wise leader” and a place to live where “one can live peacefully”.

Commenting on this incident, Western leaders expressed their fears of hacker attacks and other forms of hybrid warfare from Russia.

Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic said they were victims of hacker attacks. Germany said on Monday it had recalled its ambassador to Russia for a week of consultations in Berlin and that the Czech Foreign Ministry had summoned the Russian ambassador over the attacks.

After news of Szmydt’s escape broke, Foreign Minister Sikorski said: “We had a traitor before, it seems to be a similar case.”

In 2021, a Polish soldier, Emil Czeczko, fled to Belarus to seek asylum. The following year, Belarusian authorities announced that he had been found dead after apparently hanging himself in his home in Minsk.