After a shooting in central Kraków that left five people dead, Poland’s Ministry of Interior announced a sweeping reform of its firearms law. Purchases through sport shooting clubs will be restricted, regular psychological checks for gun owners introduced, and police must be notified of where weapons are stored. For foreigners, including Ukrainians holding a temporary residence card (karta pobytu), checks by the internal security agency will become considerably stricter.

What happened in Kraków

In Kraków, a man opened fire on people in the middle of a street. Five people were killed, and among the wounded were Polish police officers. The attacker died in hospital. According to testimony that appeared in various media, he grew up in a family with a gun culture: his father regularly took him to a shooting range. The man fired a legally owned, registered weapon.

Polish and German media immediately spoke of the end of an era of safe Poland. Since 2022 the number of gun permits in the country has grown many times over, and civilians now hold more than a million firearms.

Closing the sport-weapon loophole

Until now, the easiest way to obtain a firearm was through a shooting club: a person aged 21 who passed basic tests only needed to buy an S1-class safe. Posing as a sportsman, one person could legally stockpile an entire arsenal of automatic rifles.

The government has announced that the number of firearms per person for sport shooters and hunters will be strictly limited, and this loophole will be closed.

Regular psychological checks and home inspections

Previously, hunters underwent medical and psychological examinations effectively once, when obtaining a weapon. Now such examinations will become mandatory every 5 years, and every two years for people aged 70 and over. Any suspicion of depression or psychological instability will be grounds for confiscating the weapon.

Control over storage is also tightened: the owner must officially inform the police within 14 days of the exact address where the gun safe is kept. Home inspections will become regular and without warning.

What changes for Ukrainians

Under Polish law, a foreigner may obtain a firearms permit if they hold a permanent or long-term resident’s card (karta pobytu) and a justified reason for owning a weapon. As part of the new reform and the concept of hybrid threats, Poland’s Ministry of Interior is unofficially but significantly intensifying checks by the internal security agency on non-EU citizens, including Ukrainians.

Poland has long feared that illegal weapons circulating on Ukrainian territory could reach its own, so legal acquisition of firearms is now being examined more closely as well. Any ties, debts, or even minor administrative violations will become an automatic ground for refusal — a Ukrainian holding a residence card will need an impeccable reputation to obtain a weapon.

Indicative is also the fact that on 11 November in Warsaw, due to threats of provocations, the minister of interior signed an emergency order: a full ban on carrying and transporting any firearm within the city, even unloaded. The fine for violation is up to 5,000 zloty.

Queue of people outside a police station in a Polish city

Are the new rules enough

The five-year interval between psychological checks raises doubts: a person may feel fine at the time of the examination, yet within a few months slide into depression or run into other problems, and the next examination would not happen for years. More frequent checks of all gun owners would require significant spending, so the state is choosing a compromise between citizens’ right to self-defence and the need to prevent incidents like the one in Kraków.