Polish president discusses increased US troop presence with Trump: aide
PR dla Zagranicy
Grzegorz Siwicki
12.07.2018 09:21
Polish President Andrzej Duda has discussed an increased presence of American troops in Poland with US leader Donald Trump on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Brussels, Polish Radio reported.
Polish President Andrzej Duda (right) during the NATO summit in Brussels on Thursday. Photo: EPA/OLIVIER HOSLET Dostawca: PAP/EPA.
The meeting of the two heads of state was held at the request of the Polish president as NATO leaders attended a working dinner in the Belgian capital on Wednesday evening, the Polish public broadcaster reported, citing Duda’s chief of staff, Krzysztof Szczerski.
The outcome of their conversation was not immediately known, but Duda and Trump agreed to hold further talks on the issue, Szczerski said.
Earlier on Wednesday, Duda and Trump discussed military cooperation when they met briefly ahead of the two-day NATO summit in Brussels, according to Szczerski.
The Brussels summit of heads of state and government from 29 NATO countries on Wednesday approved the "Four 30s" plan to have 30 troop battalions, 30 aircraft squadrons and 30 warships ready to deploy within 30 days by 2020 to combat any threats, amid fears of an aggressive Russia, Polish Radio’s IAR news agency reported.
Polish Defence Minister Mariusz Błaszczak said this month that his country was in talks with the United States to host permanent US army bases, and that the talks were “on the right track."
Błaszczak was last month quoted as saying that Poland was seeking to host US troops on a permanent basis and was ready to cover part of the costs involved.
Amid fears of Russian aggression following Moscow's annexation of the Crimea region of Ukraine in 2014, NATO decided at a Warsaw summit in July 2016 to deploy four rotating multinational battalions to Poland and three Baltic states.
(gs/pk)
Source: Polish Radio/IAR