EU commissioner asks Polish foreign minister for clarification regarding visa scandal

At a press briefing on Wednesday (Sept.20), the European Commission spokesperson Anitta Hipper said the EU Commission was "following the recent media reporting about these alleged cases of fraud and corruption very closely". "These allegations are very concerning and give rise to questions regarding compliance with the EU law," she added.

Hipper explained that "this is why commissioner Johansson wrote a letter to the Polish authorities to ask for clarifications". "In her letter the commissioner also asked a set of detailed questions and also asked the Polish authorities to reply by the 3^rd of October."

"We count on the Polish authorities to provide the necessary information to the Commission and to investigate these allegations," the spokesperson said.

The TVN24 correspondent in Brussels Maciej Sokołowski has seen the letter written by Ylva Johansson.

The EU Commisioner for Home Affairs wants minister Zbigniew Rau to answer a set of questions regarding the affair. In her view, the alleged cases of illegal visa granting constitute a serious breach of the Schengen Area procedures as well as the EU Visa Code.

The questions mainly pertain to the exact scale and period in which the alleged irregularities in the visa-granting process took place, the steps the government has taken and plans to take to investigate the scandal, and whether it has managed to determine any particular cases of misconduct and those responsible for it.

The EU Commission also wants to know what structural solutions will Poland introduce to prevent any potential fraud and corruption, and how the Polish MFA intends to inform other Schengen member states about the situation.

Johansson stressed she would be monitoring the situation closely as it develops, and asked Poland to provide detailed asnwers as soon as possible.

The scandal erupted just as the ruling nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) party is seeking to secure a third term in power in parliamentary elections on Oct. 15, with a tougher stance on illegal immigration an important theme of its campaign.

Poland's foreign ministry said on Friday (Sept.15) it had fired the head of its legal service and canceled all its contracts for outsourcing visa applications.

A day earlier, seven people were charged over the alleged irregularities in granting work visas and two weeks after anticorruption officers looking in to the scandal searched the foreign ministry and a deputy foreign minister was also dismissed.

PiS has accused the opposition of exaggerating the extent of the issue and suggested some of the problems date back to the opposition's time in power.