Amendments passed late last year to Poland’s judiciary, including laws on the National Council of the Judiciary (LNCJ), to the Supreme Court (LSC) and to the Law on Ordinary Courts, do not comply with Council of Europe anti-corruption standards, concludes a report published today by the Council of Europe’s Group of States against Corruption (GRECO).
Similar critiques had been levelled already by the Council of Europe’s Venice Commission, but the GRECO report is a first ever “Ad hoc procedure,” triggered by “exceptional circumstances” after GRECO obtained information of “serious violations” of anti-corruption standards.
The 15-page GRECO report is preliminary, pending the final outcome of a more detailed re-assessment expected to be published later this year and which would take into account more recent Polish amendments to its judicial reform announced last week. It focuses on certain aspects of the law of 8 December 2017, amending the LNCJ, and which entered into force in January 2018, and the law of 8 December 2017, amending the LSC, which will enter into force on 2 April 2018.
