Missile hits Poland may not have come from Russia, says Biden.
Poland’s military was on high alert on Tuesday following what the country’s president described as “most likely” a missile strike by a Russian manufacturer.
An “emergency discussion” was scheduled to take place on Wednesday outside of the G20 meeting in Indonesia as Western leaders scrambled to respond to the possibly significant escalation of the crisis in Ukraine.
In Przewodow, two individuals were killed by a missile, according to Warsaw, which added that Moscow’s envoy has been called to give “urgent thorough explanations” but lacked clear proof as to who fired the missile.
Following a meeting of the emergency national security council, Poland’s military went on high alert.
After the conference in Warsaw, spokesperson Piotr Muller told reporters that “a decision has been made to elevate the level of readiness of some combat units and other uniformed services,” adding that “our services are on the ground right now trying to figure out what happened.”
The White House reported that President Joe Biden spoke via phone with his Polish counterpart Andrzej Duda and pledged “full US support for and assistance with Poland’s probe.”
The statement also stated that the two leaders had agreed to “stay in constant contact to decide on appropriate future steps as the probe develops.”
All three leaders of NATO member states—British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, and French President Emmanuel Macron—expressed support for Poland.
Poland is safeguarded by NATO’s dedication to collective defense, which is inscribed in Article 5 of the organization’s founding treaty, but how the alliance reacts will likely be greatly impacted by whether the incident was unintentional or deliberate.
While the alliance’s ambassadors were scheduled to conduct an emergency meeting on Wednesday, Biden also discussed the explosion in Poland with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.
Charles Michel, the head of the European Union, described himself as “shocked,” while US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken vowed to “stay closely synchronized in the days ahead as the inquiry moves further and we decide what should be our next course of action.”
Two Russian missiles struck Poland, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in what he called “a very major escalation.”
The possibility that a surface-to-air missile fired by Kiev’s forces was to blame for the explosion in Poland was denied as a “conspiracy theory” by Ukraine’s Dmytro Kuleba, while the Russian defense ministry denounced the claims as a “provocation” meant to inflame tensions.
The explosion happened after Russian missiles on Tuesday struck cities around Ukraine, including Lviv, which is close to the Polish border.
Zelensky claimed that the strikes caused automatic shutdowns at two nuclear power facilities and cut power to about 10 million people, however, eight million of them later had it restored.
In his statement, he said that Russia had launched 85 missiles at various energy installations throughout the nation.
He denounced the strikes as an “act of genocide” and a “cynical slap in the face” of the G20.
In response to the missiles fired at its neighbor, Moldova, which borders Ukraine, reported power outages and urged Moscow to “stop the destruction now.”
– “The time is now”
Zelensky said on Tuesday at the G20 meeting in Bali that “now is the time” to put an end to the conflict, while Washington stated that the G20’s fears about the destabilizing effects of Putin’s war would grow as a result of Russian strikes in Ukraine.
Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser for the White House, claimed that Russia was once more attempting to damage vital infrastructure in Ukraine.
Ukraine’s military has been advancing farther south since September. Russia this week declared a complete withdrawal from the Kherson region’s regional capital in the south, allowing Ukrainian forces to retake the city.
The missile attacks on Tuesday began after officials in Nova Kakhovka who had been recruited by Russia claimed they were fleeing the significant southern city and laid the blame on artillery fire from Kyiv’s soldiers.
Additionally, they asserted that “thousands of locals” had heeded their advice to flee in order to “save themselves,” warning that Kyiv’s forces would exact “revenge on collaborators.”
Key dam in jeopardy
A natural border now separates Russian soldiers on one bank of the Dnipro River, where Nova Kakhovka is located, from Ukrainian forces who have retaken Kherson city on the other.
It also houses the Kakhovka hydroelectric plant, which was taken at the start of the invasion due to its strategic importance in feeding the Crimean peninsula, which was seized by Moscow.
The Russian-run dam is a particular emphasis right now because Zelensky said that Russian troops intended to blow it up in order to cause a catastrophic flood.
Any flaws in the dam would make it difficult for Crimea, which Russia has occupied since 2014 and which Ukraine seeks to retake.
Last week, Russian soldiers claimed that the dam had been harmed by a Ukrainian strike.
The dam was no longer in operation, according to Vladimir Saldo, the Russian-appointed administrator of the Kherson region that is under occupation.
According to Russian outlets, he said on the state-run television channel Rossiya-24, “The situation is more serious — not with energy generation — but with the dam itself, which, in the event of an explosion, would flood a fairly significant area.
Biden denies
U.S. President Joe Biden said a rocket that struck a village in Poland near the Ukraine border was unlikely to have been fired from Russia, comments that may limit the risk of a major escalation in tensions over the incident.
Poland said Tuesday a Russian-made rocket killed two people when it landed about 6 kilometers from the frontier with Ukraine. It happened on the same day that Russian forces fired another barrage of missiles at Ukrainian energy and other infrastructure.
Asked if the rocket had been fired from Russia, Biden told reporters in Bali, where he is attending the Group of 20 summits, “there is preliminary information that contests that.”
Given the trajectory of the rocket it was unlikely it was fired from Russia, he added, “but we’ll see.”
The Polish zloty trimmed losses against the dollar as traders interpreted Biden’s remarks as an attempt to prevent the Polish incident from feeding into broader frictions with Russia.
