The European Union's executive on Wednesday said it hoped for a deal "very soon" in a fundamental dispute with Poland over judicial independence and sources said mid-May could be a key date.
After two years of a standoff between the bloc's largest ex-communist member and the more liberal founding states, Poland's ruling nationalists brought in a new prime minister at the turn of the year to seek a thaw with Brussels.
The EU has begun to see Poland, where the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party stands accused of imposing more direct government control on the judiciary, as a test case for the bloc.
Poland also stands to lose because some EU members have pushed to make access to EU funding conditional on respecting democratic values such as the rule of law and judicial independence. Poland is the biggest beneficiary of EU development aid and wants to keep the money flowing to make up for decades of communist malaise.
This year Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki has hence held a series of talks with the European Commission aiming for a deal.
After visiting Poland last Monday, the Commission's deputy head, Frans Timmermans, sounded more upbeat than previously over the row, which started after PiS won power in late 2015.
Speaking to journalists in Brussels on Wednesday, Timmermans praised the "very, very intensive talks" he had in Warsaw and commended Morawiecki for engaging in "genuine dialogue".
"It is in the interest of all of us that in none of our member states there should be a systemic threat to the rule of law. So we are working constructively in the hope of finding solutions very soon," Timmermans said. Timmermans, formerly a Dutch foreign minister, will update EU states on Tuesday.
Sources said the decisive moment comes on May 14, when the bloc's European affairs ministers are due to decide whether concessions offered by PiS go far enough to take off the table a threat to punish Warsaw through a procedure that could go as far as suspending its vote in the bloc.
Heart of the dispute
At the heart of the dispute lie PiS changes to the judiciary that, among other things, give the justice minister powers to replace court presidents. Under amendments now proposed by PiS, the minister would have to consult other judges before deciding on sacking a court head.
Timmermans also said it was positive that a new compulsory retirement age for judges would be the same for men and women. PiS had initially set it at 65 years for men and 60 for women.
"We need to see deeds, these new ideas being put firmly into law. Otherwise no one will believe it," said one EU diplomat, who also stressed that Timmermans' boss, Jean-Claude Juncker, was very eager to move on from the row.
Poland's chief power broker and PiS head, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, recently put the chances of a deal with Brussels at 80 percent and said it would come "soon".
After Warsaw insisted the judicial overhaul was needed to make courts more effective and rid them of a communist legacy, he said Poland was paying a "bitter" price to end the row.
He also said he was drawing on lessons from Warsaw's chief ally in the EU, the eurosceptic Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who has offered some concessions over the years as the EU sounded alarm that he was cracking down on critical media and non-government groups.
Źródło: Reuters