On Monday, the judge of the Regional Administrative Court in Warsaw requested asylum in neighboring Belarus, a country allied with Moscow and with tense relations with Warsaw, for fear of being prosecuted in a "fabricated espionage case".

In this context, the Warsaw Prosecutor's Office has opened an investigation into espionage and the secret services have declared that they have begun a control "to verify the extent of the confidential information to which the judge had access", added Tusk.

"We must be aware that the Belarusian services were working with a person who had direct access to the (former) Minister of Justice (...), to several confidential documents to which no intelligence service should have access", also noted the head of the Polish government to journalists.

Tusk indicated that "Szmydt's relations with Belarus are very old" and are not limited "to the last few months", also announcing on the social network X (formerly Twitter) the holding of a meeting on Wednesday of the special services on "the alleged influence of Russia and Belarus on the Polish power apparatus in recent years".

The Polish prime minister warned that European countries could be targeted by Russian and Belarusian services ahead of the European elections in June.

"The signs of a very aggressive presence of foreign services hostile to us in Europe are intensifying every day and will continue to intensify", said Tusk, indicating that he thus dispels "any illusion about the objective that Moscow and Minsk have set for the next few months".

In a message posted on the social network X (formerly Twitter), the Polish Public Prosecutor's Office declared that it is "conducting an investigation related to the information that a judge (...) requested political asylum in Belarus", indicating an article of the Penal Code relating to espionage.

The article in question provides for a sentence of between eight years and life imprisonment for anyone who provides foreign secret services with information that could "cause damage to the Republic of Poland".

At a press conference in Minsk, the judge apologized for his "audacity". "But I take the liberty of asking for the protection of the President [Alexander Lukashenko] and Belarus. There is a very wise leader here", he said, quoted by the Belta news agency, referring to Lukashenko, in power in Belarus since 1994.

On social media, Tomasz Szmydt wrote that he is a judge of the Regional Administrative Court in Warsaw and has chosen to leave his native country due to a "political disagreement" with the Polish government.

Read Also: Espionage. Poland opens inquiry into judge who requested asylum in Belarus (Portuguese version)