Poland court standoff deepens after judge suspends tribunal chief
What's new: President Karol Nawrocki cut short a Senegal trip as riot police guarded the Warsaw court and protesters demanded Bogdan Swieczkowski's return.
Poland's constitutional crisis escalated after the Constitutional Tribunal said its longest-serving judge, Anna Korwin-Piotrowska, suspended tribunal president Bogdan Swieczkowski and took charge of the court. Prime Minister Donald Tusk moved to reassure the public that the tribunal would keep operating under the law, while President Karol Nawrocki accused the government of a forcible takeover and rushed back to Warsaw from a trip to Senegal. Riot police guarded the court as several hundred protesters gathered outside. The clash is the latest turn in a dispute that has paralyzed the tribunal for years, with Tusk's pro-European coalition and allies of the previous Law and Justice government refusing to recognize each other's judicial appointees.