Poland under fire in EU parliament on vetting law

Brussels, Apr 25 (Reuters) Poland's conservative government faced harsh criticism in the European parliament today over a law to unmask former communist agents.

Bronislaw Geremek, Poland's former foreign minister and a veteran anti-communist activist, has challenged Warsaw by refusing to declare whether he worked with the secret police.

A Polish electoral commission spokeswoman and government officials have said Geremek, 75, should by law now lose his post as a member of the European Parliament.

Parliamentarians in the Strasbourg-based assembly reacted with fury at the suggestion that the well-respected figure, who helped Poland enter the EU in 2004, could lose his mandate.

''Geremek rightly objects to the witch-hunt his government seeks,'' Graham Watson, chief of the parliament's Liberal Group, said.

The dispute further tarnished the Polish government's reputation in Brussels. Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski and his twin brother President Lech Kaczynski are widely regarded as Eurosceptics who are unnecessarily tough negotiators.

''It is a shame that his great country is ruled by this government,'' said Martin Schulz, leader of the Socialist group.

Greens leader Daniel Cohn-Bendit added: ''If the (Polish) government uses Stalinist or fascist methods, we must defend our colleagues against all loonies (lunatics).'' Geremek said he had already declared he had not been an informant for the communist-era secret police and would not do it again because the law introduced in March was flawed and infringed citizens' rights.

''I have only one answer to this imperative demand of humble submission: I refuse,'' said Geremek, a leader of the Solidarity movement which helped overthrow communism in Poland in 1989.

European Parliament President Hans-Gert Poettering said the assembly would do its utmost to allow Geremek continue his work.

Earlier officials said the parliament could challenge the Polish vetting law in the European Court of Human Rights.

''Mr Geremek is a political personality of the highest esteem who has always stood up for democracy in his country and for European unification. We will examine all legal possibilities that he can continue his work,'' Poettering said in a statement.

Kaczynski proposed the vetting law after his party won an election in 2005. ''His action does not serve Poland well,'' he told a news conference of Geremek in Warsaw today.

The law is part of the Kaczynskis' drive to rid Poland of what they say is a ''web'' of ex-communists, corrupt businessmen and secret police who took control after 1989.

Reuters RS GC2101