Biden to travel to Poland to discuss Ukraine crisis: White House

 

WASHINGTON: United States President Joe Biden will travel to Poland on Friday (Mar 25) to meet with President Andrzej Duda for discussions over Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the White House said on Sunday.

"The president will discuss how the United States, alongside our allies and partners, is responding to the humanitarian and human rights crisis that Russia's unjustified and unprovoked war on Ukraine has created," White House press secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement.

The statement added that Biden's trip will come after a visit to Belgium to meet with leaders from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the Group of Seven (G7) and the European Union.

"The trip will be focused on continuing to rally the world in support of the Ukrainian people and against President Putin's invasion of Ukraine," Psaki said of Biden's trip to Europe.

"But there are no plans to travel into Ukraine," she added.

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 air base - an offer which caught US officials off guard - saying that the proposal raised "serious concerns" for the entire NATO alliance.

The United Nations has estimated that around 10 million Ukrainians have fled their homes, with about one-third of them going abroad, mostly to Poland.