Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Wednesday publicly invited President Karol Nawrocki and his family to his home for talks before next month's Christmas celebrations, making an unusual appeal for national unity amid an escalating constitutional dispute.
Speaking during Independence Day celebrations in the northwestern city of Szczecin, Tusk urged the president to put aside political differences and join him for a traditional Polish Christmas gathering at his home in Sopot, northern Poland.
"Mr. President, we were supposed to meet. I waited a little for that invitation, but rather than wait any longer, I want to invite you, together with your wife, your family, and your children, to my home in Sopot," Tusk said.
"Let's share the Christmas wafer before Christmas Eve. Let's talk," he added, referring to the Polish tradition of sharing a thin religious wafer as a gesture of reconciliation and goodwill.
"My apartment is small, but there will be room for us at the kitchen table. Let's talk, as we used to say, as one Pole to another."
"Poland is worth our conversation. Poland is worth the solidarity of Polish women and men," the prime minister said.
Tusk also appealed for unity among Poles gathering for the annual Independence March in the capital. "We can have different views, we can compete, and sometimes we are political opponents," Tusk said, stressing that independence, freedom, and national security are shared responsibilities.
"We must be able to talk about this together, without bitterness, without hatred," he added.
The invitation comes amid a deepening crisis centered on Poland's Constitutional Tribunal, where rival groups of judges and political leaders dispute control of the country's highest court for constitutional matters.
The confrontation escalated on Oct. 30 when Judge Anna Korwin-Piotrowska announced the suspension of Tribunal President Bogdan Swieczkowski and his deputy, Bartlomiej Sochanski, and assumed responsibility for the institution. The move was rejected by Nawrocki and the opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party, who accused the government of an unlawful takeover.
The dispute intensified on Tuesday when Poland's Supreme Court overturned the orders suspending Swieczkowski and Sochanski, adding another layer of legal uncertainty to the confrontation.
Poland celebrates Independence Day on Nov. 11, commemorating the restoration of its sovereignty in 1918 after 123 years of partition by neighboring powers.
