In December, an appeals court ruled that Mariusz Kaminski and Maciej Wasik should serve two years in prison for having overstepped their authority in a case dating back to 2007.
Following the verdict, the pair were detained at the presidential palace in Warsaw, having sought refuge there at Duda’s invitation – who now confirmed he has granted them pardon.
The decision came after local media reported one of the men was ordered by the court to be force-fed while on a hunger strike – stoking further tensions between the populists and the pro-European Union coalition that ousted them from power.
The conservative president and his allied PiS party accuse the new authorities of alleged rule of law violations, calling Kaminski and Wasik “political prisoners”.
“The decision regarding the pardon has been issued. Both men are pardoned,” Andrzej Duda said in a statement on Tuesday.
He added that he expected the justice minister Adam Bodnar to take an “immediate” decision to release both men from prison “on humanitarian, human, and state grounds.”
Earlier on Tuesday, Gazeta Wyborcza daily reported Kaminski was force-fed after being admitted to the hospital as his health worsened during a hunger strike he went on to protest his detention.
Duda also slammed Bodnar’s decision not to release Kaminski and Wasik while the pardoning procedure was ongoing.
“I regret that you could not afford this human gesture,” Duda said addressing Bodnar, who also holds the position of prosecutor-general, the two roles being merged by the PiS party as it overhauled the judiciary while in power.
Bodnar, representing the centrist coalition in power, issued earlier a non-binding recommendation for Duda not to pardon the convicted politicians.
Duda was speaking alongside the wives of Kaminski and Wasik whom he had received at his residence before announcing the decision.
It was not immediately clear when the pair would be freed from jail following the presidential pardon.
Both men were elected as lawmakers in the October 2023 general vote but were later stripped of the mandates as the result of the appeals court ruling.
Kaminski was originally found guilty in 2015, along with his then-deputy Wasik, of masterminding a fake graft case to discredit a high-level politician.
Duda had already granted a pardon to both men after the first verdict, but the decision was annulled by the Supreme Court as it was taken before the appeals court had its final say on the matter.