G7 leaders convene, Ukraine requests F-16s, and Warsaw mulls NATO Article 4

How global leaders are responding to the missile strike in Poland

On November 15, two missiles landed on Polish territory while the Russian army was carrying out missile strikes throughout Ukraine. The missiles landed in Przewodów, a village in the Lublin province, about five kilometers (three miles) from the Ukrainian border. According to preliminary reports from the Polish radio station ZET, the missiles landed on a farm, killing two people.

Both Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Polish President Andrzej Duda initially suggested the missiles were Russian-made. But U.S. President Joe Biden, who is currently in Bali for a G20 summit, later said it was “unlikely” based on the missiles’ trajectory that they were fired from Russia after an emergency meeting with other NATO leaders at the summit.

Andrzej Duda said that it is “highly likely” he will invoke Article 4 of the NATO charter, under which member states can call one another to confer when one considers its territorial integrity to have been threatened.

On Wednesday, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg will chair an emergency meeting of ambassadors to the alliance in Brussels to discuss the explosion. A joint statement released by NATO and G7 leaders condemned the Russian missile attacks throughout Ukraine on Tuesday and expressed support for Poland’s ongoing investigation, but did not assign responsibility for the incident in Przewodów.

The Russian Defense Ministry called the reports that the missiles were Russian-made “a deliberate provocation aimed at escalating the situation.” The statement continued, “There were no strikes on targets near the Ukrainian-Polish state border by Russian weapons. The wreckage on the scene published by the Polish media in Przewodów has nothing to do with the Russian weapons.”

In his daily video address to the nation, Volodymyr Zelensky said that “terror is not limited to our state borders,” adding that it was “only a matter of time that Russian terror would go further.”

The longer Russia feels impunity, the greater the threat will be for everyone in reach of Russian missiles. To fire missiles at NATO territory! This is a Russian missile strike on collective security! This is a significant escalation. We need to act.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba called for Ukraine to be provided with modern military aircraft and anti-missile systems “so that we can intercept any Russian missiles.” He added that “today, defending the Ukrainian sky means defending NATO.”

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