Polish opposition leader, politicians receive threats

Donald Tusk, Poland's former prime minister and leader of the main opposition party, Civic Platform (PO), has received a threatening letter, which he said results from the growing wave of hatred in Poland.

Many other opposition politicians, including former Foreign Minister and current MEP Radosław Sikorski, and two PO MPs, Dariusz Joński and Paweł Kowal, have been sent offensive letters, whose author is threatening the addressees with death.

Tusk said this was not the first threatening letter he had received so far but that "there has been a lot more of this type of correspondence in recent weeks and months."

In his opinion, "a wave of hatred, contempt, and... violence is rising in Poland," for which he blamed the leader of the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party, Jarosław Kaczyński.

"Jarosław Kaczyński, you are directly responsible for this - as the head of the ruling camp and as the deputy prime minister for security matters," Tusk said.

"You are responsible for the build-up of this wave, for the growing anxiety, for the growing fear," he added.

In a short recording posted on Twitter on Tuesday evening, Tusk said that he had received the letter on the birthday of the mayor of Gdańsk, Paweł Adamowicz, murdered in 2019, who would be 56 today.

He also cited a fragment of the message received which read: "I will put an assault knife in your stomach, like Stefan Wilmont did to this... Adamowicz."

Adamowicz was stabbed during a charity concert in Gdańsk on January 13, 2019, and died later from his wounds. Wilmont, his attacker, was arrested at the scene of the crime.

According to Tusk, the author of the letter also made threats against a heroine of the Warsaw Uprising, Wanda Traczyk-Stawska.