Kremlin calls Polish claim that Russia planned ‘acts of terrorism’ in the air unsubstantiated

MOSCOW - The Kremlin said on Jan 16 an allegation by Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk that Russia had planned “acts of terrorism” in the air against Poland and other countries was completely unsubstantiated.

Mr Tusk made the assertion on Jan 15 after meeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Warsaw, apparently referring to parcels which exploded at logistics depots in Europe which Western security officials suggested were part of a test run for a Russian plot to trigger explosions on cargo flights to the US.

“These are absolutely unsubstantiated allegations against Russia,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters when asked about Mr Tusk’s statement.

“Poland is well known for making such accusations.”

The European Union and Nato member Poland has been one of Ukraine’s biggest allies since Russia launched a war against Kyiv in February 2022.

“Poland plays a key role in Europe in countering the acts of sabotage and diversion that Russia is organising, and not just on Polish territory,” Mr Tusk told reporters.

He said some of the acts were “very dramatic”.

“All I can say, and I will not go into details but I can confirm the validity of these fears, is that Russia had planned acts of air terror, and not only against Poland, but against airlines all over the world,” he added.

In November 2024, Lithuania carried out arrests as part of a criminal probe into sending

incendiary devices on Western-bound planes.

According to the Polish and Lithuanian media, the devices, including electric massagers implanted with a flammable substance, were sent from Lithuania to Britain in July 2024 and could be behind a lorry fire outside Warsaw.

The Lithuanian president’s chief security adviser said Moscow was behind the incidents.

UK anti-terrorism police in October 2024 said they were investigating how a parcel burst into flames at a depot earlier in 2024, after a similar case in Germany blamed on Russia.

‘Problem to resolve’

Mr Tusk added on Jan 15 that Poland, which currently holds the rotating six-month presidency of the EU, will speed up Ukraine’s process to join the bloc. “The Polish presidency will break the impasse that has been evident in recent months,” Mr Tusk said.

“And we will work together with Ukraine and our European partners... to speed up the accession process as much as possible,” he added.

Mr Zelensky told reporters that “the sooner Ukraine is in the EU, the sooner Ukraine becomes a member of Nato... the sooner the whole of Europe will get the geopolitical certainty it needs”.

The Ukrainian President has been holding a flurry of meetings with his country’s backers ahead of Trump’s return to the White House.

The Republican has promised to bring a swift end to the fighting when he enters office next week, raising fears in Ukraine that it will be forced to make major territorial concessions in exchange for peace.

Mr Tusk and Mr Zelensky also spoke on resolving a decades-long dispute over the World War II Volyn killings of Poles in what is now Western Ukraine.

Mr Tusk, whose ruling pro-EU alliance faces a presidential election in May 2024, is under pressure from the national conservatives at home to secure exhumations of victims of the massacre.

On Jan 10, Mr Tusk had hailed “a decision on the first exhumations of Polish victims” but both Kyiv and Warsaw remained tight-lipped on details of what has been agreed on.

“There is a pretty obvious problem to resolve, which is the need of Polish families to bury their loved ones with dignity,” Mr Tusk said alongside Mr Zelensky on Jan 15.

“The fact that we (Poland and Ukraine) understand each other on the matter and are beginning to talk normally and have taken action, yes, that constitutes a breakthrough,” he added.

Neither side specified what concrete actions had been taken. AFP, REUTERS