POLAND. EUROPEAN OFFICIALS WARN POLAND AGAINST INTRODUCING DEATH PENALTY

September 26, 2005: European officials said that Poland would be in clear breach of its international commitments if the winners of the parliamentary elections were to reintroduce the death penalty.
Senior members of the Council of Europe, the continent's top human rights watchdog, said Poland's membership would be jeopardized. An official at the European Commission said such a step would violate the EU's charter of fundamental rights.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the leader of the Law and Justice Party which won parliamentary elections held on September 24, and his brother Lech, the Warsaw mayor vying for the presidency in October, had long spoken out in support of the death penalty as a way of fighting corruption and crime.
In 2004, the Law and Justice party, then in opposition, tabled a motion in parliament for the death penalty to be restored following a series of murders, but narrowly lost in a vote.   (Sources: Pravda, 26/09/2005)