The European Parliament lifted the immunity of a Polish MP and presidential candidate — a Ukrainian flag was recently torn down at his rally

During a vote in Strasbourg, the European Parliament supported the decision to lift the parliamentary immunity of MEP Grzegorz Braun, who is running for president of Poland.

RMF FM writes about this.

This was a continuation of the process that began in Poland: a similar decision was previously made by the Polish parliament. After Brown became an MEP following the June 2024 elections, the prosecutorʼs office asked the European Parliament to lift the politicianʼs immunity from prosecution.

The main investigation is being conducted by the District Prosecutorʼs Office in Warsaw. It concerns the events of December 2023, when Braun extinguished Hanukkah candles with a fire extinguisher during an official ceremony in the Sejm.

The aforementioned incident is not the only episode being investigated by the prosecutorʼs office. Among the charges are:

• disruption of a lecture on the Holocaust at the German Historical Institute;
• an incident at the Krakow Courthouse, where Braun took out a Christmas tree set up by judges and threw it in the trash.

According to Justice Minister Adam Bodnar, the request to lift immunity states the intention to charge Braun with seven criminal offenses, in particular:

• two — concerning the use of physical force and insulting a doctor, director of the National Cardiology Center;
• three — cover various hooligan acts;
• two more are related to scandalous behavior in the Polish Sejm: public insult to a religious shrine and physical violence against a person who tried to intervene in the situation.

The minister also mentioned another episode that the prosecutorʼs office is investigating. It concerns the events of April 16, 2024, at the hospital in Oleśnytsia. That day, Brown broke into the institution and tried to interfere with the work of gynecologist Gisela Jagielska. She performed an abortion at the 36th week of pregnancy on a patient who was in an extremely serious mental state. Brown claimed that he was conducting a "civil detention". At the same time, the doctor who was on duty was unable to get to her patients.

• Polish police are also investigating the case of the removal of the Ukrainian flag from the city council building in Biała Podlaska — this happened on April 30 during a rally of presidential candidate and MEP Grzegorz Braun.
• Videos of Braunʼs rally posted online show a man climbing a ladder onto the balcony of City Hall, pulling a Ukrainian flag from its holder, and handing it to the presidential candidate. The man then replaced it with a Polish flag. Brown shook his hand in gratitude. The crowd chanted "Here is Poland!" among other things.
• Ukrainian Ambassador to Poland Vasyl Bodnar called the incident a deliberate provocation directed against the friendship between Poland and Ukraine.
• Grzegorz Braun is one of the initiators of the blockade of the Ukrainian-Polish border. He has repeatedly spoken out against the stay of Ukrainian refugees in Poland, and was also the only deputy from the entire Polish Sejm who, in January 2022, did not vote for a resolution calling on the European Union and NATO to help Ukraine in the war with Russia.

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