One of two politicians arrested in Poland goes on hunger strike
Polish police on Tuesday arrested two politicians convicted of abuse of power in a dramatic escalation of a stand-off between the new and previous governments.
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00:00 Mariusz Kaminski, one of two serving PIS party MPs arrested on Tuesday, has gone on hunger
00:06 strike in prison. Kaminski and Mazyż-Wazik were sentenced last month to two years in
00:11 prison for dereliction of duty when they worked at the Central Anti-Corruption Bureau.
00:16 We know that police forces are gathered in the vicinity of the presidential office to
00:21 detain us and we are dealing with a very serious crisis of the state. Anarchy in the court.
00:27 The most obvious point in the court. We will be at the demonstration, we will be with decent,
00:33 normal Poles who are worried about what the government of Donald Tusk is doing.
00:38 There have been questions around the two imprisoned MPs' immunity, but Poland's ruling coalitions
00:43 say that chaos is one of PIS party's own making and that Kaminski and Wazik are trying to
00:48 escape criminal responsibility.
00:51 We expected that the party that lost the elections would look for various tricks to make the impression
01:03 that they still have an impact on what is happening, and all this is happening outside the legal
01:10 framework. They are simply overusing power, overusing positions, with a pity for the Polish state.
01:19 When the arrest took place, PIS party supporters gathered to protest in front of the presidential palace.
01:27 We will not give in! We will not give in!
01:30 Entering the presidential palace and taking people to prison,
01:36 who have been favoured by the president, is like a dictatorship, like lawlessness.
01:43 I don't want to live in a country like that, where there is lawlessness. That's why I'm here.
01:52 Another point of contention is President Andrzej Duda's presidential pardon to Kaminski and Wazik
01:58 before the final court judgment was announced, meaning some recognize it and others do not.
02:03 Meanwhile, other protests erupted at the police station. Other PIS MPs tried to intervene
02:09 and enter the station with their parliamentary IDs, but without success.
02:19 These people behind me have just announced their readiness to continue their war fight for Poland of their values.
02:25 The ruling coalition has promised the same with a policy of decisive steps.
02:30 Magdalena Wodownik for Eurozos from Warsaw.
02:33 [SWOOSH]