Poland’s long-running fight over its Constitutional Tribunal escalated sharply on Friday, October 30, when police deployed at the court in Warsaw, its president and vice-president were ordered off duty for a month, and President Karol Nawrocki cut short a trip to Senegal to return home.
The development was highlighted by the news aggregator BRICS News, which reported on X early on October 31, 2026, Malaysia time, that Polish police had seized the tribunal’s building. Polish police and media, however, said officers were deployed only on the grounds outside the building and did not enter it. Warsaw police said their actions were limited to the external area and to keeping order on the public street, Aleja Szucha, the Polish daily Rzeczpospolita reported.
A judge calls the police
According to Rzeczpospolita, police said they acted on information from Judge Anna Korwin-Piotrowska, who was elected to the tribunal by the Sejm in March, about a possible threat to the lives or health of judges and staff and a risk of public disorder. Police said they had taken no action against the tribunal’s own guards.
At around 6pm local time, a notice appeared on the tribunal’s website ordering a one-month break in the duties of tribunal president Bogdan Święczkowski and vice-president Bartłomiej Sochański, citing Article 130 of the Law on the System of Common Courts. Korwin-Piotrowska, as the judge with the longest service, took over the running of the court and later confirmed on TVP Info that she had issued the orders. The reasons given included blocking a proper meeting of the tribunal’s general assembly to adopt its 2027 spending plan and refusing since April 9 to let judges duly elected by the Sejm adjudicate, Rzeczpospolita reported.
‘A coup is under way’
Sochański said he knew of no law that allowed such interference in the tribunal’s independence. “A coup is under way,” he told Rzeczpospolita. Law and Justice (PiS) leader Jarosław Kaczyński described the events as an attack on the Constitutional Tribunal and urged Nawrocki to do everything within his powers to stop it. Prime Minister Donald Tusk wrote on X that restoring the rule of law after years of PiS lawlessness was a difficult process that required decisive action.
Prosecutor General Waldemar Żurek said he had sent the tribunal five motions to lift the immunity of the two judges, four of them concerning Święczkowski and one concerning Sochański, along with 50 volumes of case files, Rzeczpospolita reported. Nawrocki announced he was interrupting his journey to Senegal and returning to Poland. After landing in Warsaw, he went to the Presidential Palace, where Święczkowski also arrived for a meeting.
Protest at the gate
A protest formed outside the court, attended by Kaczyński, former prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki and former tribunal president Julia Przyłębska. Police detained three people who climbed the fence onto the grounds, and the lock on a gate was later cut, Rzeczpospolita reported. Święczkowski tried to enter but was not let into the building. He eventually left the grounds, telling protesters through a megaphone: “We will not fight with the police here, we will return with the president.” Supreme Court First President Zbigniew Kapiński condemned the sending of police to the tribunal as a dangerous precedent.
The crisis stems from a dispute over judges chosen by the current Sejm. Five of them, including Korwin-Piotrowska and Maciej Berek, were sworn in before the Sejm speaker without Nawrocki’s participation, and Święczkowski had not allowed them to work, Rzeczpospolita said. Korwin-Piotrowska told TVP Info that a general assembly of the tribunal’s judges had been called for Tuesday, November 3, to adopt the budget.
Source : BRICS NEWS, with reporting from Rzeczpospolita and TVP Info.
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