Poland’s Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski believes Warsaw has a duty to shoot down Russian drones and missiles approaching his country from Ukraine before they enter Polish airspace.
In an interview published on Monday by the British newspaper The Financial Times, Sikorski opposed the official NATO stance, which is that such a policy would risk an escalation of the war through a possible direct confrontation with Russian forces.
The defence alliance has so far rejected intervening against Russian drones and missiles over Ukraine as well as Kiev’s demand for a no-fly zone over the country.
Sikorski told the FT that he believes the move would be “a legitimate act of self-defence if enemy missiles are on their way into our airspace, because once they have entered the risk of someone being injured by debris is considerable.”
Membership of NATO is not above the duty of every country to protect its own airspace, he said.
NATO Deputy Secretary General Mircea Geoană said that he disagreed with Sikorski’s approach. “Of course we respect the right of every ally to ensure its national security. But within NATO, we have always consulted with each other before taking action that could have consequences for all of us,” he told the newspaper.
Poland had always consulted with its allies in this regard up until now, he said.
Last week, the Polish army used radar to detect the intrusion of an unspecified flying object from Ukraine.
The PAP agency reported, citing the military, that the altitude and speed of the object indicated a Russian Shahed combat drone of Iranian design, as used by Russia against Ukraine.
Russian missiles have violated Polish airspace several times during the on-going attacks on Ukraine.
In 2022, two people were killed when a missile crashed in eastern Poland. In this case, the cause was a misguided Ukrainian air defence missile.
