WARSAW (The Thursday Times) — Tens of thousands of people marched through Warsaw on Wednesday in Poland’s annual nationalist Independence Day march, joined by President Karol Nawrocki, days after a mass shooting in Kraków that ministers say may have been driven by far-right ideology.
City authorities put the turnout at about 250,000. Organisers claimed around 500,000. Warsaw’s mayor, Rafał Trzaskowski, said the march passed off calmly apart from the illegal use of flares, and no major clashes with police were reported.
The march, held every November 11 to mark the restoration of Polish independence in 1918 after more than a century of partition by Russia, Prussia, and Austria, has long been a flashpoint between right-wing groups and the centrist government. Critics accuse it of anti-Semitic and anti-immigrant rhetoric. Supporters call it an expression of national pride.
‘A Pole is the master in Poland’
This year’s slogan was “A Pole is the master in Poland”. An organisers’ spokesperson said the event was meant to oppose foreign influence and mass immigration. It is run mainly by people linked to the far-right Confederation alliance, and nationalists from abroad, including members of Spain’s Revuelta youth movement and Hungary’s far-right Mi Hazánk party, were expected to attend.
Nawrocki, a conservative nationalist, used the day to take aim at the government. Poland “does not exist today so that the political elites can grant themselves the right to manage citizens … against the will of the nation”, he said.
Jarosław Kaczyński, leader of the opposition Law and Justice party, called the march a show of strength and a possible start to the campaign for next year’s parliamentary elections.
Shadow of the Kraków shooting
Before the march, Prime Minister Donald Tusk appealed for restraint. “Anyone who truly cares about Poland must understand that this space, defined by independence, freedom and a secure Republic, is a common good,” he said. Tusk marked the day in Szczecin.
On Saturday, a 24-year-old gunman killed six people and wounded more than a dozen when he opened fire from his car in Kraków’s main square. He was shot by police and later died in hospital. Justice Minister Waldemar Żurek said the attacker had been interested in Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian neo-Nazi who killed 77 people in 2011, and that investigators had found clear traces of right-wing extremism.
