Poland’s prime minister calls for more defensive weapons

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Poland’s prime minister calls for more defensive weapons

Poland's prime minister has said the country was dealing with the seizure of Russian Federation's money on the grounds that it was earmarked for terrorist activities.

Morawiecki argued that Ukrainians have to be given at least defensive weapons so that they can defend their homes, lives and families.

He stated that bigger support from the US should consist in the transfer of Javelins, Stingers, all kinds of different defensive weapons, antitank, antiaircraft, antimissile, portable defence. These are weapons that are not threatening Russia. Morawiecki said these are purely defensive weapons.

Morawiecki hopes that with increasing pressure from the West and strong morale of Ukrainian soldiers, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his people would be ready to start real negotiations to have a ceasefire, withdraw Russian troops and end the war.

This should be a precondition for further negotiations. The sanctions we have adopted are the strongest and we have to prepare for even heavier sanctions. We have to cut off buying Russian gas and oil because these are the main sources of hard currency for Putin, which he then turns into a war machine, he said.

Asked if Putin could attack the Baltic countries, and perhaps even Poland and Moldova, Morawiecki replied: Yes, I think that if they are not stopped in Ukraine, they will concentrate on other states to reestablish the Russian empire. The Baltic states, Finland, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Hungary, we can all be the next target of attack. The Polish prime minister opted for permanent US troops stationed in Poland. We have 10,000 American troops here, but we should be able to have a permanent base in Poland with 30 to 40,000 US troops, he said.

In Morawiecki's opinion, Putin, who sees the invasion of Ukraine as a failure, is able to press the button and create another front. He said that we have placed these types of defensive weapons in key areas in Poland and we have been talking to our American and British allies, asking to get antimissile systems like the Patriot and Sky Sabre the British air defence system.

According to Morawiecki, it is important to confiscate the assets of Russian oligarchs and Putin himself.

Freezers can grow in value, which is why freezing is not good enough. The money from the Russian sovereign wealth fund and Russian bonds lodged in central banks of Western countries should be seized and put into a fund to reconstruct Ukraine after the war. Putin is already losing hundreds of billions of dollars and if he does not stop, he will lose even more, he said.

Morawiecki explained that a mission that would be led by the Alliance and possibly other international organisations would be completely focused on defending innocent people and could consist of both air and ground forces, based on Poland's proposal to create a Nato peacekeeping force in Ukraine.

A humanitarian peacekeeping mission has to be able to defend innocent people and not be attacked by Russian troops, he said.

He also pointed out the Polish proposal to set up a humanitarian zone in the western part of Ukraine, as more and more people are fleeing the war there. This would have to be a full mandate of Nato and possibly other international organisations, according to Morawiecki.