Asserting that it was improbable that Russia fired the missile that struck Poland on Tuesday, U.S. President Joe Biden said: “I’m going to make sure we learn out precisely what occurred.”
Biden just returned from an emergency meeting where he hosted the leaders of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the European Union, as well as the president of the European Council and the prime ministers of NATO allies Spain and the Netherlands. Biden is in Bali, Indonesia, for a gathering of the Group of 20 largest economies.
Before that, Biden talked with both NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg and Polish President Andrzej Duda.
The Russian military ministry denies any involvement in the incident, but the United States and other Western allies are looking into accusations that a bomb in NATO member Poland on Tuesday was caused by errant Russian missiles.
The Pentagon’s press secretary, Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder, told reporters at the Pentagon, “We are aware of the press reports alleging that two Russian missiles have struck a location inside Poland on the Ukrainian border. I can tell you that we don’t have any information at this time to corroborate those reports and are looking into this further.
Stoltenberg tweeted that he had discussed the explosion with Duda and expressed his sorrow for the fatalities.
According to reports, at least two Poles were slain.
“Allies are closely discussing and NATO is actively watching the situation.
It’s crucial to establish all the facts, according to Stoltenberg.
The founder of the open-source intelligence and investigative journalism organization Bellingcat, Eliot Higgins, reposted a social media image of the debris from the alleged site in Poland and noted that it appeared to be from an air defence missile, similar to the S-300s used by Ukraine to shoot down Russian missiles.
If this is verified, it may indicate that the explosion was caused by a Ukrainian missile intercept that was headed for Ukrainian land.
When asked what the event would signify for the administration, Ryder said only that “we have made quite clear that we will defend every inch of NATO territory when it comes to our security responsibilities and Article Five.”
In an act of military retaliation against Ukrainians who were celebrating one of their largest victories during the war—last week’s seizure of the important southern city of Kherson—Russia launched waves of airstrikes on Ukraine on Tuesday, hitting 10 locations, including the capital of Kyiv.
In addition to residential structures in Kyiv, where one death was confirmed, the bombings also struck other infrastructure, including energy installations.
A presidential assistant in Kyiv posted a video that showed a five-story, reportedly residential building on fire.
Three residential structures were struck, according to mayor Vitali Klitschko, although other missiles were shot down by air defence systems.
Alerts for air raids rang out across the nation.
Following days of celebration in Ukraine following the Russian withdrawal from Kherson and the Ukrainian recovery of the regional capital that Moscow’s forces had won early in the almost nine-month battle, there was a barrage of roughly 100 strikes, including missile attacks.
White House national security advisor Jake Sullivan denounced the Russian airstrikes during a gathering of the leaders of the Group of 20 most industrialized nations in Bali, Indonesia.
Sullivan said in a statement that the G20’s concerns about the destabilizing effects of (Russian President Vladimir) Putin’s war would only grow as a result of the Russian strikes. “It is not lost on us that, as world leaders meet at the G-20 in Bali to discuss the issues of significant importance to the lives and livelihoods of people around the world, Russia once again threatens those lives and destroys Ukraine’s critical infrastructure,” Sullivan said.
“We will support Ukraine for whatever long it takes,”
In response to its military setbacks, Russia has increased its long-range aerial strikes on Ukraine’s power system as winter draws near. Russia views these attacks as a psychological weapon to demoralize Ukrainians and keep them in the dark and the cold.
Strikes were reported on Tuesday in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, as well as Lviv, Zhytomyr, Khmelnytskyi, and Rivne in the west and northeast, respectively.
Oleksandr Vilkul, the head of the military administration in Kryvyi Rih, said that several missiles also struck the hometown of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Kryvyi Rih.
In addition to looking into alleged Russian violations in Kherson and the other settlements, Ukrainian officials were feverishly trying to restore electricity and water to the city.
The leader of the UN human rights office’s monitoring mission in Ukraine, Matilda Bogner, lamented a “dire humanitarian situation” in Kherson on Tuesday.
According to her, her teams are attempting to corroborate claims of roughly 80 instances of forced disappearances and arbitrary incarceration to “understand whether the scale is, in fact, higher than what we have recorded before.”
Zelenskyy stated on Tuesday that if Russia withdraws all of its forces from Ukraine and returns control to Ukrainian land along the Russian border, there would be a “true and total halt of hostilities.”
Zelenskyy warned delays in putting an end to the conflict imply additional deaths of Ukrainians and risks to the globe in a virtual address to world leaders at the G-20 conference.
Zelenskyy stated, “I am confident that this is the moment when the Russian disastrous war must and can be halted.
VOA –White House correspondent Anita Powell contributed to this report. Some information in this report came from The Associated Press.
