Ukraine-war: Joe Biden to visit Poland on Europe trip this week
- Joe Biden’s Poland trip follows meetings in Belgium with Nato allies, G7 leaders, and EU leaders
- Poland is a crucial Nato ally in the Ukraine crisis, hosting US troops and taking in people fleeing the war
US President Joe Biden has added a stop in Poland to his trip this week to Europe for urgent talks with Nato and European allies, as Russian forces concentrate their fire upon cities and trapped civilians in a nearly month-old invasion of Ukraine.
On Thursday, Biden is expected to attend special summits of Nato, the EU and the G7 in Brussels. Biden will then to travel to Poland to meet with leaders there, press secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement on Sunday night.
Poland is a crucial ally in the Ukraine crisis. It is hosting thousands of American troops and is taking in more people fleeing the war in Ukraine – more than 2 million – than any other nation in the midst of the largest European refugee crisis in decades.
Biden will head to Warsaw for a bilateral meeting with President Andrzej Duda scheduled for Saturday. Biden will discuss how the US, along with its allies and partners, is responding to “the humanitarian and human rights crisis that Russia’s unjustified and unprovoked war on Ukraine has created,” Psaki said.
On Monday ahead of his trip, Biden will discuss the war with European leaders. President Emmanuel Macron of France, Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany, Prime Minister Mario Draghi of Italy and Prime Minister Boris Johnson of the United Kingdom were expected to take part, the White House said.
The US government denied speculation that Biden would also Ukraine in the course of his trip to Europe. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, while in Poland this month, briefly crossed into neighbouring Ukraine in a show of solidarity alongside that country’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba.
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Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, along with the Czech and Slovenian prime ministers, travelled to Kyiv to visit the besieged capital last week after Russia invaded its ex-Soviet neighbour last month.
US Vice-President Kamala Harris also met with Duda in Warsaw earlier this month, with both condemning Russia’s military action, especially against civilians.
That meeting came shortly after the United States rejected a Polish offer to send MiG-29 fighter jets to Ukraine via a US airbase – an offer which caught US officials off guard – saying the proposal raised “serious concerns” for the entire Nato alliance.
On Thursday, Biden will attend an emergency Nato Summit on Ukraine as well as a G7 meeting. He will also join a scheduled European Council Summit to discuss Ukraine “including transatlantic efforts to impose economic costs on Russia, provide humanitarian support to those affected by the violence, and address other challenges related to the conflict,” the White House said.
The US has supplied Ukraine with anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons. Biden has announced US$800 million in new security assistance to Kyiv, answering Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s plea for more military aid and taking total US aid this month to US$1 billion.
Last week, Biden and China’s President Xi Jinping spoke for two hours, their first conversation since the invasion of Ukraine last month.
According to official accounts of the conversation, Xi told Biden that China regrets the war, but criticised American sanctions. Biden warned of “implications and consequences” if Beijing provided material support to Russia.
Associated Press, Reuters, Agence France-Presse, Bloomberg
