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LGBTQ+ activists in a flash mob at the Presidential Palace in Warsaw in June 2020 after Polish President Andrzej Duda signed homophobic legislation.
Łańcut County was the last locale with such a zone, and now its governing body has voted to abolish it to avoid losing European Union funding.
The last “LGBTQ-free zone” in Poland has been abolished.
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The governing council of Łańcut County voted last Thursday to repeal the resolution that created the zone, formally called a Charter of Family Rights, Notes From Poland reports. The vote was 13-5.
Council members made clear, however, that they were motivated only by financial considerations. The European Union is withholding funds from cities and counties that had such zones.
“The [council] is of the view that the over 80,000-strong community of Łańcut County cannot be deprived of benefits resulting from participation in many programs and grants,” said a statement from the council, as translated by Notes From Poland. The decision “is therefore aimed solely at preventing the exclusion of residents of Łańcut County.”
The county’s only hospital stood to lose 175,600 Euros, the equivalent of $200,000, in E.U. funding.
Nearly 100 municipalities adopted the Charters of Family Rights after the far-right Law and Justice Party won control of Parliament in 2019. Łańcut County had been the first. Some did not specifically mention LGBTQ+ people, but “instead, they express support for marriage as being exclusively between a man and a woman and pledge to ‘protect children from moral corruption’ (language often used as part of anti-LGBT rhetoric), according to Notes From Poland. Many have been brought down in court cases.
Law and Justice lost its majority in Parliament in late 2023. There is now a governing coalition of liberal and centrist parties, and Donald Tusk, a moderate, has succeeded Mateusz Morawiecki as prime minister. Conservative Andrzej Duda remains president, but the president has less power than the prime minister. Duda is term-limited and will not be up for reelection this year. He has endorsed fellow right-winger Karol Nawrocki in the election, which will take place May 18.
LGBTQ+ activists who created an “Atlas of Hate” to map the LGBTQ-free zones welcomed the Łańcut County move, while noting that it was due to pressure from the E.U. and others.
“Thanks to the efforts of many people, groups and communities, over a hundred discriminatory anti-LGBT resolutions and family charters have disappeared from Poland,” Paulina Pająk told broadcaster TVN. “These resolutions were an extreme manifestation of systemic discrimination against LGBTQ+ people.”
“I am very glad that this stage is coming to an end,” added Jakub Gawron. “But that does not change the fact that these resolutions should not have been passed at all.”
