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Poland shuts down four airports, including Warsaw’s main Chopin Airport, and urges people to stay indoors
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Poland says it has shot down Russian drones in its airspace in the early hours of this morning, the first direct engagement in the war by a Nato member state.
“An operation is underway related to the repeated violation of Polish airspace. The military has used weaponry against the objects,” Poland’s prime minister Donald Tusk said. It is not immediately clear how many Russian drones entered Poland’s airspace.
Poland has also shut down four of its airports, including Warsaw’s main Chopin Airport, and urged people to stay indoors.
Earlier, Volodymyr Zelensky claimed Russian president Vladimir Putin had told the US he plans to occupy the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine by the end of 2025.
The Ukrainian president said in an interview with ABC News aired on Tuesday: “That is, he [Putin] says that in three to four months, and this is what he told the Americans, the White House, and President Trump’s representative Witkoff, he said that he would take Donbas in two to three months, maximum four months.”
Zelensky warned that Russia’s plans could cost “years and a million people” if Moscow accelerates its offensive.
Police officials in Poland said they have discovered a damaged drone in the eastern Polish village of Czosnowka.
Police from the Lubin region confirmed the recovery of drone debris shortly after the country’s military command said Poland’s airspace was violated during a Russian attack on Ukraine.
“At 5.40am in the village of Czosnowka, police officers confirmed the discovery of a damaged drone,” the police wrote on X.
Polish prime minister Donald Tusk is meeting with ministers responsible for state security, and an extraordinary meeting of the Council of Ministers will be held at 8am local time (0600 GMT), a government spokesperson said today.
Poland said it scrambled its own and Nato air defences to shoot down drones in the early hours after a Russian air attack on western Ukraine, the first time in the Ukraine war that Warsaw has engaged assets in its airspace.
As of 4am GMT (7am local time in Ukraine), all of Ukraine – including the western regions of Volyn and Lviv which border Poland – has been under air raid alerts for several hours, according to Ukraine’s air force.
Earlier, the air force confirmed that Russian drones had entered Nato member Poland’s airspace. It said the drones posed a threat to the Polish city of Zamosc, but subsequently removed that statement from the Telegram messaging app.
Russia’s defence ministry said its air defence units destroyed 122 Ukrainian drones overnight.
Poland has informed Nato secretary general about actions the country has taken regarding objects that violated Polish airspace, prime minister Donald Tusk said this morning.
Polish air radars tracked more than 10 objects and those that could pose a threat were “neutralised,” the Polish military command said.
“Some of the drones that entered our airspace were shot down. Searches and efforts to locate the potential crash sites of these objects are ongoing,” it said in a statement.
Poland’s military command said drones repeatedly violated Polish airspace during the Russian attack across the border in Ukraine, and the defence minister said Nato command had been briefed.
Poland’s army said that the entry of drones into the country’s airspace during a Russian attack on Ukraine was an “act of aggression” that threatened the safety of the public and which required the objects to be shot down.
“This is an act of aggression that posed a real threat to the safety of our citizens,” the Operational Command of the Polish Armed Forces said on X.
We reported earlier this year that the Polish government was preparing a guide for its citizens in the event of a major war or natural disaster.
The 40-page pamphlet – titled “Safety guide” – aims to strengthen national resilience amid heightened regional uncertainty, including conflict in neighbouring Ukraine.
Polish prime minister Donald Tusk has repeatedly warned that the threat of a global war is serious and real, especially in the context of the war in Ukraine and allegations of Russian sabotage, disinformation and cyberattacks against the West.
That pamphlet was due for release this month. Here’s more from our report in July:
Democratic senator Dick Durbin said repeated violations of Nato airspace by Russian drones were a sign that “Vladimir Putin is testing our resolve to protect Poland and the Baltic nations.”
“After the carnage Putin continues to visit on Ukraine, these incursions cannot be ignored,” he said on X.
Republican representative Joe Wilson, a senior member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said in a post on X that was Russia was “attacking Nato ally Poland” with drones, calling it an “act of war”.
“We are grateful to Nato allies for their swift response to war criminal Putin’s continued unprovoked aggression against free and productive nations,” he added.
Wilson urged US president Donald Trump to respond with sanctions “that will bankrupt the Russian war machine”.
“Putin is no longer content just losing in Ukraine while bombing mothers and babies, he is now directly testing our resolve in Nato territory,” he said.
Poland has closed four of its airports, including the main Chopin Airport in Warsaw, according to the US Federal Aviation Administration.
The Rzeszow–Jasionka Airport in Poland’s southeast, a hub for passenger and arms transfers to Ukraine, was among the airports that had been temporarily closed, the FAA said.
There was no immediate official confirmation from Polish authorities that any airports had been closed.
A Nato nation, Poland has been on high alert for objects entering its airspace since a stray Ukrainian missile struck a southern Polish village in 2022, killing two people, a few months into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
But there have been no reports of Polish or allied defence systems destroying drones.
For the first time since the Ukraine war began, Poland’s authorities have also alerted people to stay indoors.
Polish military command this morning said the operation was ongoing and urged people to stay at home, naming the regions of Podlaskie, Mazowieckie, and Lublin as most at risk.
A Russian airstrike killed 24 elderly people who were collecting pensions in a village in eastern Ukraine, officials said on Tuesday, prompting President Volodymyr Zelensky to urge Kyiv’s allies to increase pressure on Moscow to end its war.
Russian troops have pressed a grinding offensive across much of the eastern Donetsk region as diplomatic efforts to achieve peace in the 3-1/2-year-old war have largely stalled.
Zelensky said a guided bomb had struck the village of Yarova, about 15 miles (24 km) from the city of Sloviansk, a Ukrainian stronghold, and several kilometres behind the front line.
“Directly on people. Ordinary civilians. At the very moment when pensions were being disbursed,” he wrote on X alongside footage showing bodies strewn across the ground.
Twenty-four people were killed and another 19 people were wounded, the State Emergency Service said. All of the dead were elderly, said regional governor Vadym Filashkin.
“The world must not remain silent,” Zelensky said. “The world must not remain idle. A response is needed from the United States. A response is needed from Europe. A response is needed from the G20.”
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