Polish president signs Holocaust-speech bill
— Polish President BERLIN
Andrzej Duda signed a law Tuesday banning people from accusing Poland of Holocaust atrocities committed by the Nazis and from referring to concentration camps as “Polish death camps” — heightening tensions with the United States and Israel, which have criticized the measure.
U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Tuesday that he was “disappointed” in Duda’s decision. “Enactment of this law adversely affects freedom of speech and academic inquiry . . . We believe that open debate, scholarship, and education are the best means of countering misleading speech,” Tillerson said.
Duda, any ally of the right wing, also announced Tuesday that he would ask the country’s Constitutional Tribunal to review the bill to check whether it complies with Poland’s fundamental rights, such as freedom of speech, potentially opening the door to amendments.
Responding to the news of Duda’s decision, Israel’s Foreign Ministry expressed hope that the constitutional review would prompt “changes and corrections.” But the law is expected to take effect before the tribunal would be able to issue any clarifications.
The bill’s international critics argue that it violates freedom of expression. Once in effect, it will essentially ban accusations that some Poles were complicit in Nazi crimes committed on Polish soil, including in the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp, where more than 1.1 million people died. Germany operated six camps in Poland where Jews and others whom the Nazis considered enemies were killed. Anyone convicted under the law will face fines or up to three years in jail.
Polish officials have emphasized that artistic and historical research work will not be affected by the ban. “But there is too much room for interpretation,” said Agnieszka Markiewicz, the director of the American Jewish Committee’s central Europe office. “Who is going to determine what artistic or academic expression means? A scholar associated with a university might be excluded, but what about a schoolteacher who shares some of the horrible stories that happened in Poland?”
The State Department agreed in a statement last week that the phrase “Polish death camps” was “inaccurate, misleading, and hurtful.” But it also cautioned that the bill “could undermine free speech and academic discourse.”
In Israel, the reaction was also fierce. “One cannot change history, and the Holocaust cannot be denied,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week.