Leaders of the U.S. Helsinki Commission from both parties have called on President Joe Biden to allow Poland to help Ukraine intercept Russian missiles. This is stated in a letter from the congressmen, the text of which was obtained by the Hill.
Congressmen Joe Wilson (Republican) and Steve Cohen (Democrat) asked Biden to give Poland the authority to ‘intercept and destroy missiles over Ukraine, including those that could threaten Polish airspace’.
The politicians recalled the tragic incident in November 2022, when two Polish farmers were killed by Russian air attacks.
In the letter, Wilson and Cohen stressed that Russia continues to escalate the situation by waging hybrid warfare, attacking critical infrastructure and violating airspace. In their view, allowing Poland to shoot down missiles over Ukraine is a necessary step to support Kyiv and protect NATO’s borders.
Earlier, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said that Poland and other countries neighbouring Ukraine have the right to shoot down Russian missiles and drones before they enter their airspace.
At the same time, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy noted that Ukraine’s allies could take similar measures as in the Middle East to intercept missiles and drones, but are not yet ready to take such a step.
This is not the first time Zelenskyy has called on NATO allies to help Ukraine protect its airspace. In April, he compared the situation to an attack on Israel by Iran, stressing that the allies must decide ‘whether the value of life is the same in different regions.’ At the same time, the Pentagon said that the situation in Ukraine is significantly different from Israel’s, and that shooting down missiles from Poland or Romania could draw the United States into the Russian-Ukrainian conflict.
