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| Slovakia spurns US missile shield in Europe |
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Wednesday, January 23, 2008
STRASBOURG, France/WARSAW: Slovakia’s prime minister on Monday criticised plans to deploy components of the US anti-missile shield in two neighbouring countries, calling the system pointless.
The United States wants to build a missile tracking radar at abase near Prague, Czech Republic, and place 10 interceptor missiles in Poland as part of the defence shield, which it says is needed to protect Washington’s European allies against a possible missile strike from Iran.
``I refuse the premise that these bilateral talks are of no concern to third countries, especially the ones that border’’ Poland and the Czech Republic, Prime Minister Robert Fico told the Council of Europe’s parliamentary assembly. Slovakia has a border with both.
``We don’t see any reason for the defence shield to move to Europe,’’ Fico said, adding that far-reaching defence decisions should be negotiated by the appropriate organizations, such as Nato or the European Union, rather than bilaterally between the United States and allied countries.
The parliamentary assembly is a grouping of 315 lawmakers from 47 European member states. It meets four times a year to debate human rights issues and social and political trends in Europe, and is currently chaired by Slovakia.
Meanwhile, Poland expects to clinch a deal with the United States in February to host US missiles as part of a defensive shield in Europe, Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said on Tuesday.
The shield, which Washington says would protect the United States and its European allies from so called “rogue” states like Iran, has strained ties between Poland and Russia, which argues the missile system would undermine its national security.
Poland’s new centre-right government wants deeper security links with the United States and would like Washington to boost its air defences with new short- and medium-range systems like the Patriot missile in exchange for Warsaw’s cooperation. Details of any such arrangements are still being hammered out.
Sikorski said in a radio interview that he expected a breakthrough during talks between Prime Minister Donald Tusk and President George Bush in Washington next month, not at a previous meeting between the Polish foreign minister and US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Feb. 1.
“I think the decision will be made at a higher level, during the Bush-Tusk meeting,” he said. The Bush administration wants to locate 10 interceptor missiles in Poland and a radar installation in the Czech Republic under a $3.5 billion defence plan.
Polish Defence Minister Bogdan Klich told Reuters in an interview before a visit to Washington this month that Poland would not participate in the project unless the United States helped bolster the country’s air defences.
During a visit by Sikorski to Moscow on Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the Kremlin would not try to pressure Poland about the missile shield, part of joint efforts to mend relations.
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ISSN 1563-9479 
