Polish Minister Rages At Spanish Attacks: Europeans Must "Wake Up" To This "Clash Of Civilizations"

Europe must "wake up," urges Poland initerior minister Mariusz Blaszczak, telling state TV that "we are dealing with a clash of civilazations," where Muslim enclaves form “support bases” for terrorists.

The official, a member of the ruling rightwing Law and Justice Party (PiS), said he asked his country’s security services what they were doing to prevent similar incidents and noted that Poland is safe because “we do not have Muslim communities which are enclaves, which are a natural support base for Islamic terrorists.”

A “possibility” to prevent terrorism is closing in Europe, according to the minister. As RT reports, Blaszczak also lashed out at the refugee resettling scheme in the EU, claiming it"s “encouraging millions of people to come to Europe,” and that would effectively have tragic consequences.

The blunt outburst comes a day after the deadly attack on a tourist area in Barcelona which left 13 people dead and more than 100 others injured.

The politician voiced his anti-immigration stance earlier this year when he suggested that Muslim settlements in Western Europe started from small numbers with Brussels now trying to shift responsibility.

Warsaw has been vehemently opposed to resettling migrants under a scheme advocated by Brussels and approved by the majority of European countries.

Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the Law and Justice leader, accused migrants in October 2015 of bringing cholera and dysentery as well as “all sorts of parasites and protozoa, which… while not dangerous in the organisms of these people, could be dangerous here.”

The xenophobic remarks caused controversy inside the government. Marek Sawicki, agriculture minister with the Polish People’s Party, the junior member of the ruling coalition, said this was “a reference to old, dangerous and dishonest sentiments from the time of the [Second World] war,”according to Politico.

Poland, along with Hungary, the Czech Republic, Romania, and Slovakia have firmly rejected the so-called refugee quotas, deepening East-West cracks in the 28-member bloc.

With every new terrorist attack carried out by non-EU nationals, the European public and politicians are showing growing discontent and unease.

Brussels has threatened legal action against the dissenting countries, filing a formal “infringement procedure” in June which could result in financial penalties imposed by the European Court of Justice.

Poland May Demand Billions In Reparations From Germany For World War II

As deep cracks have emerged in the formerly pristine diplomatic relations between Poland and the EU over the past few months, some burried ghosts from Europe"s past are making an unexpected come back.

Eight years after the fall of the Nazi regime, Poland decided to forego further reparations from Germany. But now there are renewed calls for those reparations to be paid. More than 72 years after the end of the Second World War, Polish politicians are demanding that Germany pay their country reparations. A research office of Poland’s lower house of parliament, the Sejm, is reviewing whether this would be possible according to TheLocal.

The analysis should be complete by August 11th, Sejm representative Arkadiusz Mularczyk of the leading Law and Justice party (PiS) told news agency PAP last week. The review comes after comments made by the powerful head of the PiS, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who last week accused Germany of "rejecting" its Second World War responsibilities, going as far as to suggest Berlin should pay reparations.

A demonstration marking the 73rd anniversary of the 1944 Warsaw Uprising. Photo

"We are talking about huge sums and also the fact that the Germans have for years rejected their responsibility for the Second World War," Kaczynski told Catholic radio station Radio Maryja.

Kaczynski"s brother and former President Lech Kaczynski - who died in 2010 - had estimated when he was mayor of Warsaw that the had cost the capital city alone $45.3 billion.

In August 1953, Poland’s former communist government was under pressure from the Soviet Union when it decided not to take further compensation from Germany as a way to help solve “the German question in the spirit of democracy and peace.” The Second World War had begun with the Nazis’ invasion of Poland and the war ultimately cost around six million Polish citizens their lives.

And as we wait for Poland"s decision, the rumblings are growing louder inside the government: “It is not genuine that Poland renounced reparations that were due to us from Germany,” said Defense Minister Antoni Macierewicz to Polish news channel TVP Info.

Meanwhile, German government spokeswoman Ulrike Demmer said that Germany “stands by its responsibility in the Second World War, politically, morally and financially." But she added that the question of reparations had already been legally and politically resolved. Macierewicz argues that the former communist government had been used as a puppet for the Soviet Union at the time of its decision.

“Without any discussion, the Germans owe Poland war reparations,” Macierewicz said.

Relations between Berlin and Warsaw have been on edge recently over issues including Germany’s push to share responsibility for refugees across Europe - which Poland has rejected - to the European Commission’s infringement procedure against PiS plans to have more control over the judiciary. Last month the EU sued Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, forcing them to accept refugees even as the rest of Europe turns a blind eye to the 100 thousand refugees that have made landfall in recent months in Italy.