Tusk will attend Poland's National Security Council despite Braun's party invitation

Sitting set for Tuesday afternoon

The National Security Council (RBN) is due to convene at 15:00 on Tuesday, 3 November, at the Presidential Palace in Warsaw, after President Karol Nawrocki called it. Reports say the sitting will cover the planned permanent base for American troops in Poland, and the Constitutional Tribunal may also be taken up. The council is an advisory body to the president and takes no binding decisions. Its members include the marshals of both chambers of parliament, the prime minister, the heads of the power ministries, parliamentary club leaders, the head of the presidential chancellery and the National Security Bureau (BBN). BBN head Bartosz Grodecki said the sitting will address current state security issues alongside the base plans.

Dispute over Braun's party

Whether Donald Tusk would attend stayed unclear until the last moment, because Speaker Włodzimierz Czarzasty asked the president to exclude Grzegorz Braun's Confederation of the Polish Crown (KKP) from the sitting. Foreign minister Radosław Sikorski and interior minister Marcin Kierwiński made the same appeal. Government spokesman Adam Szłapka confirmed that the prime minister would attend:

“Of course the prime minister will take part in the National Security Council.”

Szłapka argued that dozens of attendees, including people who speak openly in a pro-Russian way, would confine the discussion to public information. He said Braun, who sits in the European Parliament, will not be present, but the chairman of the KKP parliamentary club probably will. He added:

“If the president wants to exchange classified information, he should organise it in a format where there is no such problem.”

Presidential response

President Nawrocki did not exclude KKP representatives from the sitting. His spokesman Rafał Leśkiewicz told RMF24 on Tuesday that the president will receive the sitting prime minister with dignity and will shake his hand, because he respects the rules of democracy. In an October interview with Rzeczpospolita, Nawrocki argued that Braun's party has its own representation in parliament and, according to polls, backing from part of the electorate. The Presidential Palace also pointed out that KKP MPs have access to classified information and take part in closed sittings of the Sejm. Szłapka acknowledged that the president holds all the government-produced information he needs, whether classified, secret or top secret.

Opposition and energy concerns

Krzysztof Bosak, one of the Confederation leaders, told a press conference before the sitting that the government should be removed as quickly as possible:

“This is a catastrophic situation from the point of view of state security.”

Bosak accused the government of an attack on a constitutional body at a time of warnings about border provocations, and called the choice of All Saints' Day and the Day of the Dead shameful. He also criticised Anna Korwin-Piotrowska for wanting to remove protesters from in front of the Tribunal, and pointed to reports that foreign ministry staff are moving to remote work. Braun has called for Russian gas deliveries to Poland to resume and for the Nord Stream and Nord Stream 2 pipelines to be reconnected. His position echoes Alternative for Germany politicians, including party chair Alice Weidel, whose members reportedly are in contact with Russian officials and the energy sector and promise a swift return to Russian imports if they win the Bundestag election.