Polish Prosecutor's Office Brings Charges Against Deserter Who Fled To Belarus

• 21.12.2021, 13:59

He faces up to 10 years in prison.

On December 21, it became known that the Polish prosecutor's office brought charges against the Polish soldier Emil Czeczko who fled to Belarus.

He is accused of desertion. The decision to bring charges was issued by the Polish district prosecutor's office in Bialystok. This was announced by the spokesperson for the Warsaw District Prosecutor's Office Aleksandra Skrzyniarz, reports PAP.

“This is another step towards placing the accused on the criminal investigation with the aim of bringing him to justice for the crime of desertion,” she said.

Now Czeczko faces up to 10 years in prison.

Skrzyniarz added that “the actions of the prosecutor’s office will be aimed at finding the suspect in order to carry out procedural actions with his participation, and bring him to criminal responsibility for the crime.”

Earlier, Minister of Defense of Poland Mariusz Blasczak spoke about Czeczko’s “problems with the law”.

“The soldier, who disappeared yesterday, had serious problems with the law, and he filed a letter of resignation from the army. He shouldn't have been sent to guard the border. I demanded an explanation of who is to blame,” Blasczak wrote on Twitter.

According to unofficial information, writes Gazeta Wyborcza, this “soldier was arrested on December 11 for drinking alcoholic beverages with a concentration of almost 1.5 ppm and was under the influence of marijuana. After this incident, he returned to service on the Polish-Belarusian border”.

The rmf24.pl edition also wrote about the soldier's problems. They say that “his superiors knew this, but waited for him to finish the military service. He had several days to serve left. The soldier fled from his post, leaving his pistol behind. The search lasted for several hours.”

Also, the Polish media wrote that he was tried for beating his mother in the spring of 2021.