Poland’s constitutional court ruled Thursday that Polish laws have supremacy over those of the European Union in areas where they clash, a decision likely to embolden the country’s right-wing government and worsen its already troubled relationship with the EU, AP news reports.
The Constitutional Tribunal held that some provisions of the treaties binding EU members and some rulings by the 27-nation bloc’s highest court conflict with Poland’s Constitution. Two of the 14 judges who considered the case dissented from the majority opinion.
The tribunal initiated its review of law supremacy in July on a motion from Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki. He asked for the review after the European Court of Justice ruled in March that Poland’s new regulations for appointing judges to the Supreme Court could violate EU law, which takes precedence. The ruling obliged Poland’s right-wing government that had introduced the regulations, which gave politicians influence over judicial appointments to discontinue them and to observe the independence of justice.
The tribunal majority said Thursday that Poland’s EU membership since 2004 did not give the European court supreme legal authority and did not mean that Poland had shifted its law sovereignty to the EU. They said no state authority in Poland would consent to an outside limitation of its powers.
