Its priorities for the six-month term include building relations with the EU's eastern and southern neighbours, and encouraging economic growth.

It also says it wants to promote further EU enlargement. Prime Minister Donald Tusk is hoping that the EU presidency will boost his Civic Platform party and help it retain power in national elections in October.

The BBC's Adam Easton in Warsaw says Poland wants to portray itself as a regional power with ideas worth heeding, with perhaps chief among them a focus on the bloc's eastern neighbours.

It hopes an "Eastern Partnership" summit in September gathering leaders from the EU and six former Soviet nations will give the initiative new impetus, and wants to conclude negotiations on a free trade agreement with Ukraine.

Poland, with a population of 38 million, is the largest country to join the EU since its expansion in 2004.

It is the fourth former communist state to hold the EU presidency, after Slovenia in 2008, the Czech Republic in 2009, and Hungary in the half of 2011.

Recent surveys suggest that backing for EU membership within Poland stands at more than 80 percent.