my guest today is the polish foreign minister witold waszczykowski.t is poland, that was a country held up as a model of post—soviet transition, turning away from liberal democracy? and what does this mean for its people and its place in europe and the world? foreign minister witold waszczykowski, in warsaw, welcome to hardtalk. 20 months ago, your law and justice party won the elections, now it is facing a lot of criticisms. what has gone wrong? i don't think anything is wrong in poland. we are running the country for the last 21 months. we've got a very strong democratic mandate from our people in poland. and we are trying still to modernise the country, develop the country, and, of course, to stay in the european union and in nato and implement all the decisions of these institutions, also here in poland. after the fall of the soviet union, poland was seen as a bastion of liberal democracy. we had lech walesa, leader of the solidarity movement — he became president and won the nobel peace prize. the world bank heaped praise on poland for making the

foreign minister witold waszczykowski, and warsaw, welcome to hardtalk.tions but is now facing criticisms. what has gone wrong?” criticisms. what has gone wrong?|j don't criticisms. what has gone wrong?” don't think anything is wrong in poland. we are running the country for the last 21 months. we have very strong democratic mandates from our people in poland. and we are trying to modernise the country, develop the country, and of course to stay in the european union and in nato and implement all the decisions of these institutions, also here in poland. after the fall of the soviet union, poland was seen as a bastion of liberal democracy. we had the leader of the solidarity movement who became president and want the noble peace prize. the world bank heaped praise on poland for making such a successful transition from communism to democracy. and now look, you are getting criticisms from abroad, and also internally, for being too authoritarian. we are still a democratic country, and we wa nt to still a democratic country, and we want to continue our mcreddi