Donald Tusk has been sworn in this morning as Poland's new prime minister by Polish president Andrzej Duda.
The ceremony at Warsaw's Presidential Palace was attended by cabinet ministers from Mr Tusk’s new centrist, pro-EU government.
The new coalition government, which encompasses four diverse parties, won a vote of confidence in parliament just before 10pm Polish time last night.
That vote had been scheduled for earlier in the evening but was delayed due to an incident in parliament in which a far-right MP used a fire extinguisher to douse a Hanukkah menorah at a ceremony for Poland’s Jewish community.
Poland's new government includes many new ministers from all four parties but also sees the return of Radoslaw Sikorski as minister for foreign affairs, a position he previously held a decade ago.
This morning’s ceremony draws to a close a two-month protracted process of government formation since October’s general election, which witnessed the largest turnout of voters of any Polish election since the fall of communism in 1989.
Mr Tusk was previously prime minister between 2007 to 2014 before taking up the role of European Council President from 2014 to 2019.
During his time in Brussels he took a tough stance on Brexit negotiations with the UK and was at the helm during the migrant crisis of 2015.
Mr Tusk will govern a very different Poland this time around after eight years of rule by the nationalist-populist Law and Justice party.
His top priority will be trying to unlock €35 billion in EU pandemic recovery funds.
Those funds were frozen because of concerns the European Commission had over the previous government’s changes to the judiciary.
Since 2015, Law and Justice administrations exerted control over the Constitutional Tribunal, the country's highest court, and the National Council of the Judiciary, a body that appoints and promotes judges.
Both courts are currently stacked with Law and Justice appointees.
Mr Tusk has promised to restore the independence of the courts.
However, any major proposals to reverse legislation introduced by Law and Justice could be vetoed by Mr Duda. He is widely viewed as an ally of the previous government.
The coalition government is also tipped to make changes to the senior management of public media, which became a mouthpiece for the previous government's policies in recent years.
Mr Tusk and his centrist Civic Platform party, along with liberal and socialist MPs, support access to abortion up to the 12th pregnancy.
However, two of the coalition parties - a farmers’ party, and a majority of MPs from the centre-right Poland 2050 party - hold more conservative views towards the issue of abortion.
The leader of Poland 2050, Szymon Holownia, said during the election campaign that he would favour a referendum on the current near-total ban on abortion.
Mr Tusk will be in Brussels tomorrow to represent Poland for a two-day council summit of EU leaders.
The council will take an important decision on whether to start formal accession talks with Ukraine on its application to join the EU.
Poland is a supporter of Ukraine's EU membership bid and Mr Tusk's presence could lend added weight to the view held by many member states that formal talks with Kyiv could start next year.
Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban has said that he is opposed to starting formal talks with Kyiv and could veto the proposal.
