Polish, U.S. Leaders Plan Missile Defense Talks

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk and U.S. President George W. Bush are expected to discuss the White House’s plans for missile defense installations in Europe during an upcoming meeting in Washington, the Associated Press reported Saturday (see GSN, Feb. 27).

Tusk is expected in Washington from March 8-10.  He anticipates discussions on how the Bush administration would go about supporting modernization of the Polish military as part of the deal to place 10 missile interceptors in the European nation.

“I’m not going to Washington to make declarations, but rather to hear whether Poland’s expectations — which are not excessive — as to U.S. help in modernizing Polish armed forces are being treated seriously or not,” Tusk said.

Poland has said its military needs modernization in 17 areas; it is also seeking U.S. air defense systems through the missile shield deal.

U.S. and Polish negotiators met Friday in Warsaw.

“We talked about the situation in the region, about security and about challenges and threats to Poland,” said Deputy Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski.  “Then we discussed the condition of the Polish army, whether what we have is sufficient to counter these threats and we tried to identify the areas where Polish armed forces need to be modernized” (Associated Press I/Yahoo!News, March 1).

“While we have much work to do on both sides to clarify the details of how we can work together on these issues, we made a good start today,” acting U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Stephen Mull said following his meeting with Waszczykowski (Associated Press II/International Herald Tribune, Feb. 29).

Further negotiations are planned for Thursday, ahead of Tusk’s visit to Washington, Agence France-Presse reported.

Russia has objected strongly to the U.S. plan, which also calls for placing an early warning radar system in the Czech Republic, as a threat to its security.  It has threatened to aim missiles at any U.S. missile defense sites in Europe.

Supporters of the U.S. plan say it would be developed to counter an Iranian missile threat and poses no danger to Russia.

Poland might allow Russian officials to inspect the interceptor site, Waszczykowski said.

“We are prepared to welcome Russian inspectors.  But according to the principle of reciprocity, we will also be interested in inspecting Russian installations of the same type,” he said (Agence France-Presse, March 1).

Meanwhile, U.S. and Czech officials are expected this week to continue negotiations on the radar base, AP reported.  An agreement has been delayed by Czech requirements for environmental controls on the site.  However, Bush and Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek said last week they expected a deal to soon be finalized (AP II, March 1).

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