Impact in Poland: USA probably assumes Ukrainian missile

According to preliminary US findings, the missile that struck Poland came from Ukraine. This is reported by several media. US President Biden is said to have announced this at a meeting with other heads of state and government from NATO and G7 countries.

According to media reports, there are growing indications that the missile that hit Poland may not have been fired by Russia. Various news outlets, citing US officials, are reporting that initial findings indicate that the missile was an anti-aircraft missile that Ukrainian soldiers apparently fired to repel a Russian missile amid massive Russian attacks on energy infrastructure.

According to information from the dpa news agency, US President Joe Biden said at a meeting with other heads of state and government from NATO and G7 countries in Bali that the projectile was an anti-aircraft missile from Ukraine. He is said to have spoken of a missile from the S-300 system.

Shortly before, Biden had described it as “unlikely” that the missile that struck Poland was fired from Russia. He referred to their trajectory.

Emergency meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit

Two people were killed in the impact in Poland near the Ukrainian border in the east of the country on Tuesday. Biden then called an emergency meeting of G7 and NATO leaders on the sidelines of the G20 summit on the Indonesian island of Bali.

Biden said he updated allies on his talks with Polish President Andrzej Duda and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg in the wake of the missile strike. There was “complete agreement” at the table to support the Polish investigation into the attack. “I’m going to make sure we find out exactly what happened,” Biden said.

Poland is stepping up surveillance of its airspace

The Polish Foreign Ministry had previously confirmed the impact of a Russian-made missile. Both Ukraine and Russia use Soviet-designed missiles.

According to Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki in the evening, Poland is increasing surveillance of its airspace. Warsaw also announced that Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau had summoned the Russian ambassador and demanded “immediate, comprehensive explanations”.

At the same time, Morawiecki called on his compatriots to calm down: “We have to exercise restraint and caution.”

Poland’s armed forces in increased readiness

A spokesman for the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs stressed that on Tuesday there was a massive shelling of the entire Ukrainian territory and its critical infrastructure by the Russian army. The village of Przevodow is about 60 kilometers as the crow flies from the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, which was also the target of Russian attacks.

After the incident, Poland put part of its armed forces on increased readiness. This also applies to other uniformed services, said a government spokesman on Tuesday evening in Warsaw. It is about specific military combat units and the combat readiness of units of the uniformed services, he said, without giving any further details.

Moscow speaks of “provocation”

Russia had previously responded to reports of explosions. The Ministry of Defense in Moscow described the Polish media’s statements about rocket hits as deliberate provocations. The reports are aimed at escalating the situation, the Interfax news agency quoted the ministry as saying.

No targets in the Ukrainian-Polish border area were fired upon. The photos of alleged pieces of debris circulated in the Polish media also had nothing to do with Russian weapon systems, it said.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Kuleba denied that the rocket was fired by Ukraine. “Russia is now spreading a conspiracy theory that it was allegedly a missile from the Ukrainian air defense system that fell on Poland,” Kuleba wrote on Twitter in the evening. “That is not true.”