Ganley courts far right anti Semitic radio in Poland

Ganley recently did a secret deal with a Polish bishop in an attempt to get the support of Radio Maryja. Do we really want religion in politics? Should priests have the influence they had when Ireland was a sea of clerical sex abuse? i don't think so. faith is a private matter and should be kept out of political decisions.

As the Fenian Charles Kickham urged in the Irish People newspaper in 1864 in an article "Priests In Politics", priests should stay away from politics and stick to ministering for the spiritual well being of their flocks. They have no place at the centre of a republic's political life. Vote no to Ganley and his secret deals with the far right religious.

Polish Right-Wing Radio Station to Get EU Money

Radio Maryja, a right-wing broadcaster founded by an ultra-conservative Catholic priest, is in line to get €15 million in European Union funding. The money would go to expand a journalism school for the station, which has been accused of anti-Semitism.

AP

Ultra-Catholic broadcaster Radio Maryja, whose Torun, Poland headquarters are shown here, may be awarded EU funding.

A right-wing Polish radio station founded by an ultra-conservative Polish Catholic priest is in line to get European Union funding.

Radio Maryja, which has been accused of being anti-Semitic and anti-EU, may receive more than €15 million in EU funding for a private university, Poland's Minister of Regional Development Grazyna Gesicka said Tuesday. The project has fulfilled all the necessary criteria and will get the EU grant, Gesicka said.

Her statement confirmed an earlier report in the Tuesday edition of the Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza that the school was on a list of 350 projects that Warsaw has recommended to receive EU funding. The money will go to expand Radio Maryja's journalism school, the Torun-based Higher School of Social and Media Culture.

However the European Commission disputed that the funds had been approved. Commission spokeswoman Katharina von Schnurbein told the news agency AFP that the EU's strict ban on discrimination must be adhered to if Radio Maryja was going to get EU money. "We have clear criteria and values," she said. According to sources in the EU quoted by AFP, Radio Maryja's radical stance would reduce its chances of getting funding.

NEWSLETTER

Sign up for Spiegel Online's daily newsletter and get the best of Der Spiegel's and Spiegel Online's international coverage in your In- Box everyday.

A spokeswoman for the European Commission told the news Web site EU Observer that the commission could use anti-discrimination rules "to stop the project if necessary."

Radio Maryja was founded by the controversial Catholic priest Tadeusz Rydzyk, who was caught on tape earlier this year making anti-Semitic remarks which were then published in the Polish weekly Wprost. According to the magazine, Rydzyk accused Polish President Lech Kaczynski of being "in the pockets of the Jewish lobbies," and said that if you give them aid, "they will come to you and say 'give me your coat. Take off your pants. Give me your shoes.'" He also referred to Kaczynski's wife as a "witch" for her support of abortion rights.

Rydzyk's recent meeting with Pope Benedict XVI was condemned by international Jewish groups. He has close links to the Kaczynski twins, who are prime minister and president of Poland, and the support of Radio Maryja is thought to have been instrumental in getting the Kaczynskis' Law and Justice party elected in 2005.