Foreign minister criticises president for declaring Poland’s willingness to host US nuclear weapons

May 6, 2024 | Defence, Politics

Foreign minister Radosław Sikorski has criticised President Andrzej Duda for his recent remarks suggesting that Poland is willing to host US nuclear weapons.

He accused the president – who is an ally of the former ruling party and has regularly clashed with the current government – of failing to consult with the foreign ministry on major foreign policy announcements.

“I have asked the president privately and publicly not to discuss such delicate and secret matters in public, because it does not help Poland,” Sikorski told broadcaster TVN on Sunday during a visit to the US.

The minister was asked by TVN if talks are ongoing regarding Poland’s access to the so-called “nuclear sharing” programme, whereby nuclear-armed NATO countries locate some of their weapons in non-nuclear states.

“From what I know, it has already been communicated to the previous government and to the president that this idea is not on the table, so I don’t understand what this is about,” said Sikorski.

After Duda’s recent comments, senior figures from Law and Justice (PiS) – which was Poland’s ruling party until the end of last year and is aligned with Duda – expressed support for the idea of Poland hosting nuclear weapons.

In his remarks to TVN, Sikorski also expressed surprise at Duda’s recent appeal to Prime Minister Donald Tusk for Poland to use its upcoming presidency of the Council of the European Union to organise summits with the US and Ukraine.

“The presidency of the EU is the competence of the foreign ministry,” said Sikorski. “The constitution clearly states who conducts foreign policy in Poland.”

“Within the government, we are discussing what the Polish presidency [of the EU] should look like, but President [Duda] has not agreed this with anyone, neither the EU, nor our permanent representative office, nor the government,” he added. “This is not an example of good cooperation.”

In a separate interview for Polskie Radio, Sikorski likewise said that Duda had not consulted with the government before publicly calling in March for NATO to increase the recommended minimum defence spending for member states from 2% to 3% of GDP.

“The president did not discuss this with the government,” said the foreign minister. He added that he was “sceptical when it comes to raising expectations in this way” because it risks “dooming to failure” July’s NATO summit in Vilnius.

Sikorski said that, ahead of that summit, the government would adopt a position on this issue that Duda would be obliged to present there. He noted that the constitutional court has confirmed that it is the government that decides foreign policy.

Duda has regularly been in disagreement with Tusk’s government. However, the president and prime minister have generally sought to present a united front on defence and foreign policy, including holding a joint visit to the White House in March.

On Saturday, during his visit to the US, Sikorski met with General Keith Kellogg, who served in the Trump administration and remains an adviser to the former US president.

“We want the best possible relations with America, regardless of who rules here, and we will not make the mistakes of our predecessors by putting all our chips on one colour,” said Sikorski, referring to the former PiS government’s close relations with Trump.

During a recent visit to the US, Duda met with Trump at the latter’s residence in New York.


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Main image credit: Sebastian Indra/MSZ (under CC BY 3.0 PL)

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