Poland

The age of consent for all in Poland is 15 and was introduced in 1932. The Polish Constitution prohibits discrimination on all grounds. Marriage is restricted to a man and a woman only. Poland joined the European Union on the 1st of May 2004 and adopted anti-discrimination provisions laid down by EU directives. Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski was finally voted out of office in 2007 and the new government was formed by Donald Tusk´s Civic Platform (PO). While the government of Donald Tusk had shown inertia where gay and lesbian equality was concerned, first indications of a small shift towards greater openness in this area of Polish politics nonetheless exist. In 2011, the Polish parliament saw its very first introduction of a registered partnership bill, presented by opposition party SDL. And when Tusk was re-elected in October of the same year, the left-wing populist Ruch Palikota, whose agenda includes the introduction of same-sex civil partnerships, also achieved a respectable result. In recent years, the Gay Pride Parades have either been prohibited or were confronted with hostile counter-demonstrators if they did go ahead. The era of prohibitions at least is now over. On July 17 2010 the EuroPride took place in Warsaw with over 10 000 participants who marched through out the streets of Poland’s capital. There was no violence. There are three Pride Festivals (with Pride Marches) in Poland: in April in Krakow called Queer May in June in Warsaw called Equality Days and in November in Poznan - Equality and Tolerance Days. The gay scene is mainly located Warsaw, although some other large cities like Krakow, Lodz, Poznan, Wroclaw and Gdansk have an emerging gay scene.