Polish defector judge to become BelTA correspondent

The new task of Tomasz Schmidt, who already calls him­self a jour­nal­ist and pub­li­cist, is to inter­view invit­ed guests. Do Rzeczy report­ed on the new job of the Pol­ish judge, who is under crim­i­nal inves­ti­ga­tion in Poland.

Tomasz Schmidt at his first press con­fer­ence in Min­sk on May 6. Pho­to: BelTA

“It’s a very good job. I won’t pub­lish the con­tract though,” Tomasz Schmidt wrote on his social media.

Tomasz Schmidt, a judge of the 2nd Depart­ment of the Voivode­ship Admin­is­tra­tive Court in War­saw, fled to Belarus on 6 May 2024, where he asked for polit­i­cal asy­lum. The defect­ed judge said he had been “per­se­cut­ed and threat­ened in Poland because of his inde­pen­dent polit­i­cal posi­tion.”

Pol­ish For­eign Min­is­ter Radosław Siko­rs­ki called Schmidt a “trai­tor.”

“We had a trai­tor before, and I think this is a sim­i­lar case.”

The min­is­ter was evi­dent­ly ref­er­enc­ing defec­tor Emil Czeczko, who was dis­cov­ered deceased in Min­sk in March 2022. A crim­i­nal case has been ini­ti­at­ed in Poland, and he faced up to 10 years in prison.

The Nation­al Prosecutor’s Office of Poland has ini­ti­at­ed a crim­i­nal case against Tomasz Schmidt for espi­onage. Accord­ing to the prosecutor’s office, Mr. Schmidt “par­tic­i­pat­ed in the hybrid war waged by Belarus and Rus­sia against Poland.”

The Belaru­sian regime imme­di­ate­ly gave the new defec­tor the works, and he began to praise Lukashen­ka in every pos­si­ble way. Here is one of the lat­est quotes:

“It’s enough to look at today’s sit­u­a­tion: how he behaves, how he con­ducts pol­i­tics. This isn’t a com­pli­ment; it’s a fact. Besides, you can envy his phys­i­cal form. Just look at how he chops wood, how he shoots arrows in Mon­go­lia.”