Ziobro, pictured here in 2022, faces up to 25 years in prison if convicted of the charges laid against him – Copyright AFP Wojtek RADWANSKI<\/p>\n
Poland\u2019s former justice minister Zbigniew Ziobro, wanted on several criminal charges in his home country, has fled Hungary to the United States, he confirmed on Sunday, following local media reports.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI am in the United States,\u201d Ziobro told right-wing broadcaster Republika. \u201cI arrived yesterday, and this is my third time traveling around the country,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Ziobro, who received asylum from right-wing ally Viktor Orban\u2019s government last year, faces up to 25 years in prison in Poland if convicted of the charges laid against him.\u00a0<\/p>\n
They include abuse of power, leading an organised criminal enterprise and using funds meant for crime victims to buy Israeli Pegasus spyware, allegedly to monitor political opponents.<\/p>\n
After Orban\u2019s party was ousted from power in an election in April, Hungary\u2019s new Prime Minister Peter Magyar \u2014 who was sworn in on Saturday \u2014 said that Hungary would no longer protect people wanted elsewhere.<\/p>\n
\u201cHungary will no longer be a dumping ground for internationally wanted criminals,\u201d he told journalists the day after his victory, naming as examples Ziobro and his former deputy, Marcin Romanowski, suspected of embezzling nearly 40 million euros ($47 million).<\/p>\n
The Republika broadcaster reported earlier on Sunday that Ziobro was in the US, while liberal broadcaster TVN24 published a photo of Ziobro at Newark Liberty International Airport, which it said had been taken by another traveller.<\/p>\n
It is unclear how Ziobro managed to travel to the United States, as Poland had previously said his travel documents \u2014 including his Polish and diplomatic passports \u2014 had been revoked.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Poland to contact US \u2013<\/p>\n
Current Polish Justice Minister Waldemar Zurek wrote on X that Poland \u201cwill reach out to the USA and Hungary with questions regarding the legal basic that enabled Zbigniew Ziobro to\u2026 enter the United States despite lacking valid documents\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will not cease or efforts to ensure that he and Mr. Marcin Romanowski are held accountable before the Polish justice system,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Earlier, Zurek told the Polsat broadcaster: \u201cIf it is confirmed that Ziobro is in the USA, then (Poland) will request his extradition.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ziobro was the leader of the ultra-conservative Sovereign Poland party, a junior coalition partner of the nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) party, and served as justice minister and attorney general\u00a0between 2015 and 2023.<\/p>\n
He is also known as the architect of contentious judicial reforms which sparked a standoff between Poland and the European Commission.<\/p>\n
Asked by Republika about his potential extradition, Ziobro replied: \u201cI am ready to appear before any court, and an American independent court is certainly an independent court.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf they want to initiate extradition proceedings, by all means,\u201d he added, calling extradition cases in US courts \u201ca demanding procedure\u201d.<\/p>\n
He has rejected the charges against him, accusing the centrist Polish government of conducting a witch hunt against conservatives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ziobro, pictured here in 2022, faces up to 25 years in prison if convicted of the charges laid…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5848,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4841,1395,3773,9,851],"class_list":{"0":"post-5847","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-poland","8":"tag-extradition","9":"tag-justice","10":"tag-minister","11":"tag-poland","12":"tag-us"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5847","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5847"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5847\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}