Agence France-Presse, Poland is seeking “specific provisions” from the U.S. in return for allowing an American missile defense shield to be put up on its territory, the country’s foreign minister said in an interview published April 30.
Speaking to the Financial Times, Anna Fotyga said that Poland “[has] to know that the [missile defense] installation itself and other criteria enhance security: Polish, US, global [and] international security.”
She said that she had sought “specific provisions” that would strengthen Polish security in areas such as “clear assessment of threats, the kind of installations [involved], the agreement over bases and installations itself and other issues referring to cooperation — defense and military cooperation.”
Poland is considering hosting interceptor missiles as part of Washington’s planned missile defense system based in Eastern Europe. The U.S. has proposed putting 10 missiles in Poland and a targeting radar in the Czech Republic by 2012. They would be oriented toward ballistic missile threats from the south.
Russia has reacted angrily to such proposals, which it says pose a threat to its interests.
Citing unnamed Polish sources familiar with the situation, Financial Times said Poland is carrying on with plans to request U.S. Patriot missiles to aid its defenses.
Fotyga, asked by the newspaper about these plans, did not comment on specific Polish requests for Patriot missiles.
“Poland believes there could be additional threats to Polish security, so instead of jumping and talking about Patriots or other advance systems, let’s have a rational and serious discussion about what those threats might be,” said U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Europe Dan Fried.
“You can’t jump from, ‘Gee, we think we have a problem,’ to, ‘Patriot missiles are the answer’,” Fried was quoted by the paper as saying. “The Poles need to get their thinking together and then we will deal with this a step at a time.”
