Warsaw: Around 15,000 people hit the streets in the Polish capital Warsaw Saturday for a "We, the People" march, the latest in a series of pro-democracy protests against the right-wing government for its alleged violation of democratic standards.
Protestors also rallied in support of Solidarity hero Lech Walesa, amid fresh allegations he acted as a communist spy triggered by newly-found 1970s secret police files that he insists were fabricated.
Opposition politicians, including the leaders of two liberal parties that staunchly oppose the conservative Law and Justice (PiS) government, joined the protests for the first time.
"We've come to make it clear that freedom and democracy are the most important values guarded by the constitution," said Mateusz Kijowski, founder of the Committee for the Defence of Democracy (KOD) which organised the demonstration.
The protest was organised under the slogan "We, the people," citing the preamble of the US constitution. Walesa used the phrase when he addressed US Congress in 1989, the year communism collapsed in Poland.
Moves by the PiS government to take greater control of the Constitutional Court, media and other institutions have triggered harsh criticism both at home and across Europe.
The European Union recently launched an unprecedented probe to see if the Polish government is violating the bloc's rules on democracy and whether it merits punitive measures.
Led by former premier Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the eurosceptic PiS has been in power since an October election, and has regularly butted heads with the media and the opposition.
"The PiS wants to control everything, the state, the economy and the people," Jan Rogalski, a 48-year-old Warsaw resident told AFP.
"We can't let them take us back to communist times."
- 'Stop destroying democracy' -
On a cold but sunny day in Warsaw, thousands gathered in front of the national stadium before snaking several kilometres (miles) through city streets to a war memorial in the centre.
Many carried Polish red-and-white national flags along with the EU's blue-and-gold, as others touted banners saying "Stop destroying democracy".
Some wore Lech Walesa face masks and carried "We back Walesa" banners.
"We also want to show our solidarity with Lech Walesa, who symbolises the victorious struggle for freedom and democracy in Poland, Europe and around the globe," KOD leader Kijowski said.
Fresh allegations that Walesa had collaborated with the communist regime surfaced last week when state prosecutors seized previously unknown regime documents from 1970-76 from the widow of a communist-era general.
While Nobel Peace Prize winner Walesa -- renowned for negotiating a bloodless end to communism in Poland in 1989 -- enigmatically admitted to having "made a mistake", he insists files implicating him are "complete fakes."
"For us, Lech Walesa is a symbol of freedom, he's an icon and we won't allow his name to be dragged through the mud," Warsaw resident Aneta Osieczko told AFP.
"Even if he may have signed something (secret police documents) in the 1970, I think that doesn't undermine all his later accomplishments."
AFP
