Worldcrunch
WARSAW — Of the nearly 4,000 foreigners who have applied for international refugee protection in Poland since the start of the year, just 38 have received refugee status. Though the majority of those granted the refugee protection (21) were from Syria, the largest number of applicants were from Russia, and other former Soviet countries, which […]
It is not the first time Lech Walesa, Poland’s revered first president of the post-Communist era, has been accused of being a spy for the old regime, having been cleared by a court in 2000. But new accusations yesterday that the now 72-year-old was a paid informant for the Communist authorities in the 1970s, before […]
Critics have lambasted the cover of Polish newsweekly wSIECI (The Network), which depicts a screaming white woman wrapped in the European Union flag being pulled at and fondled by six dark and hairy arms. “The Islamic Rape Of Europe” reads the cover line. In the lead article of the widely read magazine, writer Aleksandra Rybinska […]
“Kaczynski Takes Poland,” writes Polish daily Fakt on Monday’s front page, one day after the Conservative and eurosceptic Law and Justice party (PiS) swept to victory in Poland, ousting the ruling center-left and pro-EU Civic Platform. PiS leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski — the twin brother of Poland’s late President Lech Kaczynski, who died in a plane […]
To this day, Poland has participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 17 times, achieving its best result with a second place on the year it first participated, in 1994. About this year’s entry — the Bonnie-Tyleresque ballad “In The Name Of Love” — singer Monika Kuszynska said: “This year’s Eurovision Song Contest’s motto is Building […]
The recent terror attacks in Paris didn’t inspire much Polish empathy, in part because Poles have trouble identifying with the West’s multicultural societies. That needs to change.
Poles in the United States, Brazil and Britain recount how they’ve tried to adapt to the season in their new homelands. It can be bittersweet, as Polish traditions for them still hold sway.
SLUPSK — One of the first things journalists wanted to know after the recent mayoral election in Slupsk, a small city in northern Poland, is what the winner planned to do with the Pope John Paul II portrait hanging in his mayor’s office. Will he remove it? Does he plan to rid the office of religious symbols? Obviously irritated, Mayor-Elect Robert Bierdron fired back with some queries of his own. “What are you even asking me about?” Bierdron responded. “Why don’t you ask me about my plans for Slupsk?” Already known throughout the country as the first openly gay member […]
It gets harder to feel the weight of history’s most brutal hours when you’re surrounded by tourists soaking in the sun and thinking about lunch plans.
The Polish Solidarity leader and Nobel Peace Prize Winner offers a combative vision for how Europe can stand up to Moscow. He speaks from experience.
With the arrest of former Polish Archbishop Jozef Wesolowski, the Pope is showing that he will crack down on child sex abuse in his Church by ending any protection of criminals.
Russia may be officially forbidding Western food on grocery shelves, but facing skyrocketing prices and shortages, it’s allowing Belarus and Kazakhstan to act as intermediaries.
Why are Poles such a gloomy and miserable lot, always assuming the worst and refusing to love thy neighbor? It turns out, cheerlessness here has deep roots.
Designers in Poland are giving religious T-shirts and other products a hipster makeover, mixing pop culture with the Bible to create a uniquely 21st-century look.
Graduates who come back to Poland after earning prestigious degrees at Oxford or Cambridge often find themselves shut out of the labor market. Blame a mix of suspicion and envy.
By Patrick Randall On June 21, the Swedish Barbecue Team won the European Barbecue Championship that took place in the heavenly town of Znin, in Poland. With 24 teams participating in eight different events that included cooking pork ribs, beef briskets or fish, this competition was one of the high points of the year for […]
WARSAW — While protests swept Maidan Square in Kiev, both Polish and German media reported the same storyline: Ukraine was overthrowing a bloody dictator and changing its course toward the West. German politicians, much like their Polish counterparts, made fiery speeches and pushed the European Union to address a “serious offer” to Ukrainians. The pro-Ukrainian […]
Janusz Korwin-Mikke, who has made outrageous comments about women and the disabled, has managed to gain a following among disenchanted, young Poles.
Protesters from the political far-right denounced the funeral honors bestowed on the last Polish communist dictator, General Jaruzelski. But with him gone, their cause may disappear too.
Quotes that made news, news that made quotes…
A decade after Poland became part of the European Union, Gazeta Wyborcza sent a reporter on a train from Warsaw to Berlin to take stock of the transformation among Polish passengers. WARSAW — “There are only two vivid and well-maintained places in my native Wloclawek (a city in northern Poland with a population over 100,000): […]
Should a state be driven by law, or by force? Russia’s neighbors, friends and enemies must reflect on what’s really at play in the showdown over Ukraine.
Two sisters return to the camp 70 years after they were first brought there, sharing memories of snowball fights, feelings of guilt and the need to never forget.
A smile, a chuckle, a LOL, a full-throated guffaw: getting yourself laughing is good for the soul, good for your health.
It will take the international community years to recover from the trust Russia violated over its illegal interference in Ukraine. But Putin and his close collaborators will never be punished.
– Commentary – WARSAW — The Washington Post story was both scary and a bit comical: Polish intelligence received $15 million from the CIA to operate secret prisons — or “black sites” — and the money was supposedly delivered in two cardboard boxes. Hmmm. According to my calculations, the dimensions of the two boxes would […]
Immigrants from Eastern Europe are an all-too-convenient target for the Tory prime minister as voters still struggle despite reports of economic recovery.
Russia’s own Academy of Sciences has declared the country the European leader in aggressive and loathsome behavior. And if you doubt it, just consider the grim statistics.
Like generations before who’d set off for North America, Asia and Western Europe, emigrants from the Philippines have arrived over the past decade in a growing Poland to find work.
For one prominent Polish columnist, all the European Union’s panting for expansion to the East may lead it to choke on its own ambitions.
The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) governed Mexico, at times with an iron fist, for 70 years until it lost the presidency in 2000. It returned with Enrique Peña Nieto’s victory in this year’s presidential elections. But have politics changed in Mexico? Will the PRI resort to its old ways, asks Luis Rubio,* or will it […]
Technological advances and ethical questions have forced societies to constantly redraw the thin line between life and death. (Happy Dia de Muertos!)
LODZ — If 50 years ago somebody had told our Polish grandparents that they would be able to have a video call with someone from anywhere in the world, they probably would have sent that person to the nearest chapel to beg forgiveness for heresy. Today, we are confronted with futuristic visions like scanning people […]
PARIS – Everywhere skills transform lives, generate prosperity and promote social inclusion. And if there’s one lesson the global economy has taught us over the last few years, it’s that we cannot simply bail ourselves out of a crisis — stimulus plans and printing money can never be a lasting solution to our economic problems. […]
In Poland, Catholics have already seen it all on the religious front at home. To expand their spiritual horizons, many now look for new religiously significant destinations farther afield.
BYDGOSZCZ – Five-year-old Dobrusia has been in the Pediatric Oncology Division at Jurasz Hospital in this northern Polish city for a week now. “We are still waiting for the diagnosis, so we are not sure what to expect,” says her mother. As she and her family anxiously anticipate her exam results, Dobrusia spends much of […]
After becoming the first person in Poland born from in vitro fertilization, Agnieszka Ziolkowska, 26, decided it was time to act after Catholic leaders compared IVF to “plant breeding.”
Recycling is slow going in Poland, and you can see the results all of the streets and sidewalks. What does it all say about the Polish character?
WARSAW – There is a smell of perfume in the air and salespeople dash between white leather armchairs and handbags worth thousands of euros. Welcome to the first Polish Louis Vuitton store, which opened in Warsaw earlier this month. I am here to meet Robert Eggs, president of the French luxury brand for Northern Europe. […]