Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki has stated that, based on the evidence gathered so far on the fall of two missiles near the Ukrainian border, he «probably» will not activate NATO’s Article Four, which involves opening consultations with other member states.
The Alliance’s statutes provide for this article in case of threats to the territorial integrity or security of any of its members. Although the Polish authorities raised it as a possibility late on Tuesday, they are now inclined to be cautious.
Polish President Andrzej Duda also preferred to speak of an «unfortunate» incident when talking about projectiles which, according to Morawiecki, were likely to have come from Ukrainian defense systems and not from Russian forces, which on Tuesday launched their biggest wave of attacks on Ukraine since the beginning of the invasion in February, according to the PAP agency.
«There is no indication that it was launched from Russian territory,» Duda has alleged. However, Warsaw has avoided blaming Kiev directly and has framed the event within an escalation of tensions that it attributes to Moscow, which has denied from the outset that it was responsible for the shooting.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg also said Wednesday that preliminary investigations indicate that it is «probable» that the death of two people in Poland was provoked by Ukrainian anti-aircraft defenses, «to defend the territory from a Russian attack».
