Riot police have been deployed at Poland's Constitutional Court amid an escalating stand-off between the government and the court's top judges, BBC reports.
The row pits the government of Prime Minister Donald Tusk against his predecessors from the right-wing Law and Justice (PiS).
The police intervention came after Justice Minister Waldemar Żurek said he had requested stripping the court's President Bogdan Święczkowski and Vice-President Bartłomiej Sochański of their immunity from prosecution to bring criminal charges against them.
Tusk has vowed to depoliticise the judiciary, and on Friday defended the move as PiS supporters gathered outside the court premises in Warsaw in protest.
President Karol Nawrocki, who is backed by PiS, has now entered the constitutional court, according to his chief of staff.
Nawrocki cancelled a trip to Senegal mid-air in order to attend to the confrontation in Warsaw. He had been on his way to the Summer Youth Olympic Games in Dakar.
Riot police were deployed to prevent any demonstrators from entering the court building.
In a social media post, the Constitutional Court wrote that the two judges the government wants to prosecute were still the legally appointed senior justices of the court.
"All persons participating in these actions are committing the crime of a coup d'etat," it said.
