WARSAW – With their nation’s football hooligans spotlighted after a string of high-profile incidents, Polish authorities on Tuesday launched a new legal crackdown aimed at stemming trouble at Euro 2012.
“This sporting event cannot be dominated by agression, by hooligans and thugs,” Justice Minister Krzysztof Kwiatkowski told reporters as he presented a raft of measures to be in place in time for the European championships. A key plank is fast-track handling of troublemakers, with special rooms being set up in stadiums with video links to courthouses from which judges will try the defendants.
A similar system was used at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver last year, Kwiatkowski noted. In addition, the government plans a new system of electronic tagging for hooligans who have already been banned from Poland’s football stadiums, in a drive to ensure they do not slip through the net. Around 1,800 people are currently serving stadium bans due to hooliganism in Poland, a nation of 38 million.
In the event that they breach their tag conditions, they will be jailed.
Kwiatkowski said the government also planned to beef up the prison sentence for bomb-hoaxers to eight years from the current six months. The measures are due to be submitted to parliament in May. The 16-nation, quadrennial football showcase kicks off in Warsaw on June 8 that year and ends with the final on July 1 in Kiev, capital of co-host Ukraine. Concerns about Polish football hooliganism have been raised for years.
But they have returned to the fore ahead of Euro 2012, and have heightened after Poland fans clashed with security forces at an away friendly against Lithuania on March 25.
