The impact of at least one Russian missile on Polish territory, which caused the death of two people in Przewodów, a town near the border with Ukraine, sparked the biggest alarms on Wednesday, and prompted the Polish Prime Minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, to Urgently convene the National Security and Defense Commission. Moscow denied any responsibility for the explosions and accused Warsaw of “deliberate provocation.”
For its part, the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed that the projectile was “of Russian manufacture” and announced that it had summoned the Russian ambassador in Warsaw to ask for explanations.
Hours later, President Andrzej Duda acknowledged that they had no definitive evidence to prove who launched the missile. Despite this, he considered it very likely that this morning the country would ask NATO for consultations between member countries in accordance with Article 4 of the North Atlantic Treaty.
At the same time, NATO itself also announced for Wednesday the convening of a meeting of allied ambassadors chaired by the organization’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, “to discuss this tragic accident,” a spokeswoman told Europa press. This measure supposes de facto carrying out the contacts between allies established in the aforementioned article 4.
The incident occurred on a day when Russian President Vladimir Putin – absent from the G-20 leaders’ summit in Bali, where a statement likely condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine was being prepared – ordered the launch of more of a hundred missiles on Ukrainian cities, many of which were left without power. Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky attributed the explosions in Poland to Russian missiles, saying they represent “a very significant escalation” and “an attack on collective security”, for which he called on NATO to act.
Meanwhile, Polish radio ZET reported that two stray Russian missiles had hit a barn in Przewodów, killing two people. Przewodów is located about ten kilometers from the Ukrainian border, in the province of Lublin.
According to coincident information from the Polish media and US intelligence cited by the Ap agency, these are Russian devices, although late at night the Pentagon said it could not confirm that they were Russian projectiles. The journalist for Polish station ZET who broke the story, Mariusz Gierszewski, later wrote on his Twitter account: “My sources in the services say that what hit Przewodów is probably the remains of a missile shot down by the Ukrainian armed forces. ”.
Yesterday Tuesday was, in effect, a day in which the Ukrainian military had to use large doses of anti-aircraft defense due to the rain of Russian missiles. A large part of the projectiles were directed against Ukrainian energy infrastructure. Half the country was left without electricity. The Ministry of Energy of Ukraine assured that it was the worst blow to the electrical service since the beginning of the Russian invasion on February 24. In addition, 67% of the country was left without internet. The attacks left at least one dead in Kyiv. It was also the biggest bombardment since October 10, when the Russians launched 84 missiles. “Russian missiles are killing people and ruining Ukraine’s infrastructure right now. This is what Russia has to say about peace talks,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitro Kuleba tweeted.
Tension grew in eastern Europe and in the Baltic countries due to what happened on Polish soil. The Latvian Defense Minister, Artis Pabriks, enunciated on Twitter the relevance of what happened by noting that the Russian missiles had “landed on NATO territory in Poland.” Pabriks added that “Latvia fully supports the Polish friends and condemns this crime,” without providing any evidence for the prosecution.
Also the Prime Minister of Hungary, Viktor Orbán, convened his national security council after the impact of projectiles on Polish territory. The Magyar concern had already grown during the day because Ukraine, after the Russian air attacks suffered on its territory on Tuesday, decided to close the Druzhba oil pipeline, one of whose branches supplies Russian oil to Hungary and Slovakia.
