Nationalist Independence Day march in Warsaw: 250,000 by police count, 500,000 by organisers

The march

Poland's Independence Day march filled central Warsaw on Wednesday, 11 November, marking the restoration of the independent Polish state in 1918 after 123 years of partition between Prussia, Austria-Hungary and Russia. Participants gathered in the centre of the capital from 14:30 local time, and the march officially ended at 20:00 local time. Before it began, organisers ran a 'city of independence' of stalls and tents in front of the Palace of Culture, where nationalist groups, hunting associations and far-right movements each had their own stand. The stands offered white and red wreaths, prayer books and patriotic books, often eurosceptic, anti-Ukrainian and antisemitic in content. The march has taken place on 11 November every year since 2011, and this year's motto was 'Poles, masters of Poland'.

Crowd estimates

Police and authorities put the attendance at no fewer than 250,000 people. Organisers had expected 500,000 people beforehand and later gave that same figure, and their spokesman, Rafal Buca, said there were certainly more than half a million Poles present. Other reports described the crowd as tens of thousands, or simply as thousands. Each headline figure comes from a different side, and the reports do not give an independent count. Authorities had feared violent incidents, so police deployed a large operation that was still visible in the city centre early in the evening.

Police and authorities (at least)250,000

Organisers500,000

Police and authorities (at least)

250000 people

Organisers

500000 people

Data from the article text

Participants and slogans

President Karol Nawrocki led the column, followed by Jaroslaw Kaczynski, leader of the Law and Justice (PiS) party, and Grzegorz Braun, a far-right politician whose past antisemitic incidents drew international attention. Other figures from the right and far right also took part in the march. Some marchers carried a banner reading 'Make Europe white again', held by several young people dressed in black with their faces covered by hoods, and some of them carried flags bearing the Celtic cross. Chants of 'Poland is not for sale' rang out, while other protesters directed slogans against Prime Minister Donald Tusk, whom they called a 'dictator'. The organisers' website explains the motto 'God, Honour, Fatherland' as a commitment to defending national identity, sovereignty, national interests and the Christian order.

Cracow attack and political backdrop

The march came days after an armed attack in Cracow on Saturday, 7 November, which a 24-year-old man is suspected of carrying out. Reports differ on the death toll: one put the number of dead at nine, another at six, and both give 15 injured. On Tuesday, 10 November, Justice Minister Waldemar Zurek said the suspect had been interested in Anders Behring Breivik, the neo-Nazi who killed 77 people in Norway in 2011, a remark that some reports read as a sign the suspect held far-right views. The march also took place during a political crisis between Tusk's centrist government and the nationalist right over the Constitutional Tribunal, whose legitimacy has been contested for years because of controversial nominations made under previous nationalist governments. In late October, gendarmes blocked the entrance to the Tribunal's premises. Authorities raised security measures ahead of the march to head off confrontations between rival groups.