Amid death threats, a Polish judge who fought communists now battles his nationalist government
KATOWICE, Poland - People want to kill Waldemar Zurek. They shout epithets at him on the street. News sites call him a traitor, thief and disgrace to his country. His crime, as he put it recently stepping out of a courtroom where he faced anti-government charges, is at once simple and dangerous:
"Doing my job."
Zurek is among hundreds of judges who have marched against the harassment, discipline and dismissals they've encountered for criticizing Poland's increasingly zealous nationalist government. They range from local judges to the Supreme Court president. Judges from 22 European countries joined them on the streets of Warsaw in January to oppose changes they said would erode the independence of Poland's courts.
In the four years since the right-wing Law and Justice party was elected to power, this nation that was once hailed as a post-Soviet success story has become the object of scorn among human rights groups. Legislators have imposed restrictions on news outlets, clamped down on museums, called for the closing of its borders to Muslim refugees and railed against gay rights as a
