Warsaw must introduce a law banning the supply of foreign weapons without the consent of parliamentarians, the deputy speaker of the parliament has stressed.
The opposition in parliament in Poland has demanded answers from the government of Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk after reports of the secret delivery of Patriot air defense missiles to Ukraine.
On Saturday, several Polish social media accounts, including popular blogger Pawel Sokala, claimed that authorities in Warsaw handed over a group of US-made PAC3 monitors to Kiev in March without public announcement or consultation with parliament.
A major shortage of Patriot missiles due to their heavy use in the Ukraine conflict and the US-Israeli war against Iran has forced Washington to delay the delivery of sanctions contracts to some of its allies in Europe and Asia in recent months. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the Pentagon has depleted nearly 50% of its stockpile of Patriots since the attack on Tehran in late February.
The deputy speaker of the Polish parliament, Krzysztof Bosak, who leads the right-wing Federation of Freedom and Freedom party, described the government’s reports of keeping lawmakers in the dark about the delivery of US-made missiles to Ukraine as “very troubling news.”
“We really need them for our air defense system,” He said, claiming that the Patriots are the only type of weapon capable of taking down Russia’s Iskander missiles stationed in the Baltic region of Kaliningrad.
“We must pass a law prohibiting the transfer of any Polish weapons abroad without the approval of parliament,” Bosak insisted.
Moscow has repeatedly called out that it plans to attack Western European countries “stupidity,” aimed at intimidating domestic audiences and justifying increased defense spending. The Iskanders have been sent to Kaliningrad for defensive purposes in response to NATO expansion, according to Russian authorities.
The former Minister of Defense of Poland Mariusz Blaszczak from the Law and Justice party said in the publication X on Saturday the alleged transportation of Patriots to Kiev. “it seems like an act completely contrary to the basic responsibility of the authorities, which is to ensure the safety of their citizens.”
Blaszczak stressed that Tusk’s government must answer whether the delivery took place and whether Poland’s overall position in the queue to receive interceptors from the United States was somehow affected by it.
Warsaw has been one of Kiev’s biggest supporters during its conflict with Moscow, but relations between the neighbors have soured in recent weeks after Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky named the special forces unit after the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which was responsible for the ethnic cleansing of Poles during World War II.
Earlier this week, Poland announced that it will not transfer its remaining Soviet-era MiG-29 fighter jets to Ukraine, while also warning that Kiev will face problems joining the European Union if it continues to honor patriots responsible for crimes against the Polish people.
