Donald Tusk questioned by Polish investigators over 2010 plane crash
The European Council president was the Polish prime minister at the time of the crash in Russia which killed 96 people.
Investigators in Poland have questioned Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, as a witness in an investigation into the 2010 plane crash that killed Polish President Lech Kaczynski.
The case is widely seen as a politically driven attempt to discredit the EU leader.
Mr Tusk was the Polish prime minister at the time of the crash, which occurred in Russia and killed 96 people, many of them senior Polish state and military officials.
Prosecutors said they are trying to determine why Polish authorities of the time did not take part in the post-mortem examinations, which were performed by Russians and later shown to be sloppy.
Exhumations have revealed that body parts got mixed up and were buried in the wrong graves.
Mr Tusk’s Polish supporters see the questioning as part of a political feud going back years that pits him against Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the late president’s twin brother and the head of the ruling Law and Justice party in Poland.
Mr Kaczynski holds no government position but is widely seen as the man who directs all major government decisions.
Ahead of Thursday’s questioning in Warsaw, Mr Kaczynski warned that Mr Tusk “should be afraid”.
Katarzyna Lubnauer, a politician with the opposition Modern party, said calling Mr Tusk to give evidence was an act of “political revenge and an attempt to humiliate the former prime minister”.
Mr Tusk’s lawyer Roman Giertych said he believed “political motivations” were behind the decision to question him.
Mr Tusk – who was questioned as a witness in a separate investigation in April – is considered one of the most charismatic and effective politicians Poland has had in years, and the only one able to unite a weak and divided opposition.
Should he ever return to Polish politics, he would represent a major threat to Mr Kaczynski, who is pushing an agenda for radical change considered an attack on democratic norms by the EU.
Mr Tusk – who has openly criticised the Polish government – is often mentioned as a possible candidate in presidential elections in 2020, soon after his tenure as European Council leader ends.
Mr Kaczynski, a former prime minister who lost to Mr Tusk’s Civic Platform party in 2007, has long accused Mr Tusk and Russia of responsibility for the tragedy that killed his brother, but Mr Tusk denies that and accuses Mr Kaczynski of using the tragedy for political purposes.
