Poland's political evolution has much significance for the rest of Europe and is being watched increasingly closely by its EU partners. This month has been more turbulent than most since president Lech Kaczynski and his twin brother Jaroslav, the prime minister, pulled off a spectacular victory for their right-wing populist Law and Justice Party in October 2005.
They are putting their personal stamp more and more on a fissiparous coalition, leading to two resignations of prominent ministers and last month's forced resignation of Archbishop Stanislaw Wielgus over his collaboration with secret police in the communist period.
Poland's European and foreign policies are also making waves, as is clear from the interview with President Kaczynski in this newspaper today. He visits Ireland next week to mark the historic connections between our two countries. They have been deepened by the migration of up to 200,000 Poles here in search of employment. It is fitting that this should be recognised officially and that Irish people should hear more about Poland's current political and social priorities.
President Kaczynski believes most Poles here will return home over the next five years to a more prosperous and confident Poland, where their skills are badly missed. Even if he is right the new relationship - increasingly matched by Irish investment in Poland - is bound to develop further over the next generation and needs nourishing.
President Kaczynski's party and his brother's government are sceptical about proposals to revive the EU's constitutional treaty and are to propose a less ambitious plan next month. Integrationists are in danger of provoking a negative response, he believes, since the nation-state has not yet exhausted its repertoire of traditions, histories and languages. Poland was at the centre of bargaining on the treaty under Ireland's EU presidency in 2004 and Mr Kaczynski will not find any enthusiasm in Dublin to upset the balance of compromises reached then.
He should listen carefully to this advice, since disintegration can also come from his direction. Poland needs to co-ordinate its proposals with the German EU presidency, which aims to reach a consensus on how to proceed. This will be a test of its real commitment to the exercise of sharing sovereignty in Europe, irrespective of past and present grievances which have recently loomed so much in Poland's relations with Germany. These can be mediated through Europe, as Ireland and Britain have demonstrated.