New legislation 'may lead to civil war' - former Polish president

REUTERS - Hundreds of Poles demonstrated outside the Supreme Court in Warsaw on Wednesday (July 4) after new legislation came into force that requires about a third of judges at the Supreme Court to retire. Lech Walesa, a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and former president credited with bringing down Polish communism in 1989, came from Gdansk to Warsaw to express his objection to the court changes. The conflict has isolated Poland in Europe, where most governments are critical, and the European Union are involved in a long-running dispute with Poland over democratic values. The EU accuses Poland's ruling right-wing Law and Justice party (PiS) of trying to control the judiciary and subvert democratic standards. Warsaw says the changes are needed to free the judiciary of communist-era thinking and practices, adding that EU treaties do not give Brussels institutions the power to influence national matters such as the judiciary.