President signs new constitutional court law

President of Poland Andrzej Duda signed a new bill on the Constitutional Tribunal into law on Saturday, the Chancellery of the President informed. "The new law on the Constitutional Court resumes the decisions envisaged in the 1997 Constitutional Court law and brings court-related legal provisions into line with the Constitution," read a statement. The new bill introduces a series of amendments compared with the previous law passed in December, which was heavily criticized domestically and internationally for breaching democratic standards. The passed amendments include doing away with a requirement for the president to agree for a Constitutional Tribunal judge to be removed, if the Tribunal’s disciplinary court has ruled on such a move, and to not allow the president to motion for a given case to be considered by the Tribunal outside of the chronological order in which cases were submitted. The opposition, however, claims that the new bill breaches the Constitution and doesn't meet recommendations made by the Venice Commission.