Here’s what Poland’s neighbors said
Poland’s neighboring NATO and European Union allies responded with a mixture of patient concern and anger to the explosion Tuesday.
Lithuania’s defense minister, Artis Pabriks, said in a tweet: “[The] criminal Russian regime fired missiles which target not only Ukrainian civilians but also landed on NATO territory in Poland.”
Others, however, were more reserved. The Czech prime minister, Petr Fiala, said that if it was confirmed to be a Russian attack, “this will be a further escalation by Russia.”
Alar Karis, the president of Estonia, said he was in contact with the Polish president and would consult on “further activities.”
China urges all parties to ‘stay calm’
All parties should “stay calm and exercise restraint, and avoid escalation of the situation,” China’s foreign ministry spokeswoman, Mao Ning, told a regular news briefing on Wednesday after the blast in Poland.
China, which has a strategic partnership with Russia, has refrained from condemning Moscow’s actions in Ukraine or calling it a war. It has tried to position itself as neutral in the conflict, calling for peace negotiations and expressing opposition to the use of nuclear weapons.
CIA director met with Zelenskyy after warning Russia on nuclear weapons
CIA Director William Burns met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other officials in Kyiv on Tuesday, a U.S. official said.
The visit came a day after Burns met his Russian counterpart in Turkey. The official said Burns discussed a warning he delivered to the head of Russia’s foreign intelligence service not to use nuclear weapons.
The CIA director also sought to reinforce the U.S. commitment to provide support to Ukraine in its fight against Russian forces, the official said. Burns’ safety was not in jeopardy during the visit, despite the wave of Russian missile strikes on the country, the official said.
Biden heads home as G-20 summit concludes
President Joe Biden is on his way back to Washington after attending a Group of 20 summit in Indonesia that was shadowed by the deadly missile strike in Poland and international divisions over Russia’s war on Ukraine.
The G-20 is made up of the world’s largest economies, including China, Russia, the United States and the European Union. The summit concluded with a joint communiqué that reflected members’ divergent approaches to Russia’s aggression, with “most” of them strongly condemning the war but not all.
Biden left the island of Bali on Air Force One at 2:25 p.m. local time (1:25 a.m. ET), and is expected to arrive at Joint Base Andrews late Wednesday.
Indonesia was the president’s last stop on a weeklong trip that also included visits to Egypt for the United Nations climate change conference and Cambodia for a summit of Southeast Asian nations. During the G-20 summit, Biden also held his first face-to-face meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping since taking office.
Here’s what Ukraine said about the incident
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy directly accused Russia of firing the missile that killed two people in eastern Poland on Tuesday night, describing it as an attack on Europe’s collective security.
“How many times has Ukraine said that the terrorist state will not limit itself to our country? Poland, the Baltic states… It’s only a matter of time before Russian terror goes further,” he said in his nightly address Tuesday.
Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Russia was peddling a “conspiracy theory” by suggesting that the strike was caused by an errant Ukrainian air defense missile. “No one should buy Russian propaganda or amplify its messages,” he said on Twitter.
Here’s what Russia said about the incident
Russia strongly denied being responsible for the blast that killed two people Tuesday in rural eastern Poland.
“Polish mass media and officials commit deliberate provocation to escalate situation with their statement on alleged impact of ‘Russian’ rockets at Przewodów,” the Russian Ministry of Defense said on its Telegram channel Tuesday.
Images of the wreckage in the aftermath of the strike “have no relation to Russian firepower,” the ministry said.
Biden says it’s ‘unlikely’ missile was launched from inside Russia
U.S. President Joe Biden said the missile that killed two people in Poland near the Ukraine border likely was not fired from within Russia, but that it is under investigation.
“There is preliminary information that contests that,” Biden said after a meeting of the Group of Seven and NATO leaders in Indonesia, when he was asked if the missile had been fired from Russia. “It is unlikely in the lines of the trajectory that it was fired from Russia, but we’ll see.”
Biden spoke with Polish President Andrzej Duda, offered full U.S. support for the investigation, and “reaffirmed the United States’ ironclad commitment to NATO,” of which Poland is a member, the White House said.
Poland’s security chiefs to meet after explosion near Ukraine border
Polish political and security leaders will meet again Wednesday to discuss the NATO member country’s response to the explosion that killed two people in a rural village near the border with Ukraine on Tuesday.
The country’s National Security Council will meet at noon local time (6 a.m ET), after first meeting on Tuesday night.
Before that Poland will also take part in the NATO meeting Wednesday morning, and President Andrzej Duda will meet Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and other government figures.
Poland’s National Security Office was already “analyzing the arrangements made so far with commanders, service chiefs and allies,” Jacek Siewiera, head of the National Security Bureau, said in a tweet early Wednesday.
NATO to meet in Brussels after deadly Poland blast
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg will chair a meeting of the transatlantic military alliance on Wednesday in Brussels, Belgium, to address the deadly explosion in Poland.
Stoltenberg will brief the media after the meeting, in a news conference scheduled for 12.30 p.m. local time (6.30 a.m. ET)
Under Article 4 of the NATO Treaty, a member state can call for the alliance to come together to consult in the event of a security threat. All NATO decisions are taken as a consensus.
NATO, G-7 leaders offer full support to Poland
The leaders of NATO and the Group of Seven nations offered their full support for Poland following the deadly explosion near the NATO member’s border with Ukraine.
The NATO and G-7 leaders said in a joint statement after an emergency meeting in Indonesia that they will remain in touch to determine “appropriate next steps as the investigation proceeds.”
“We discussed the explosion that took place in the eastern part of Poland near the border with Ukraine,” the statement said. “We offer our full support for and assistance with Poland’s ongoing investigation.
Poland says two killed by Russian-made missile
Two people in southeast Poland were killed by what Poland’s foreign ministry said was a Russian-made missile Tuesday afternoon.
The missile fell in the community of Przewodów, which is near the Poland-Ukraine border, around 3:40 p.m., Poland’s foreign ministry said.
“We have no evidence as of yet who fired that missile,” Polish President Andrzej Duda said, but added the projectile was Russian-made and an investigation was ongoing. Duda said “what happened was an isolated incident. There is no indication that more will take place.”
It came after Russia launched a wave of airstrikes on cities across Ukraine on Tuesday, hitting civilian infrastructure and causing widespread blackouts.
Share your story or advertise with us: Whatsapp: +2347068606071 Email: info@newspotng.com
