Poland Expects Russia to Target Its Border Crossings With Ukraine

Poland believes Russia may target its border crossings with Ukraine, after Warsaw averted a threat to one of its own crossings overnight.Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk made the remarks at a press conference in Bratislava, Slovakia on Thursday, Sept. 10, according to Reuters. Overnight from Tuesday into Wednesday, Sept. 8-9, Russian drones struck the Ukrainian side of the Tudora-Starokozache crossing, killing two Ukrainian nationals and injuring seven people, including a Moldovan national.JOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official.“Last night, thanks to cooperation between our services and their ​Ukrainian counterparts, a direct threat to one of the border crossings ​was averted,” Tusk said.“As you know, Russia has already resorted to provocative attacks on border ​crossings – for instance, in Moldova. We expect similar actions targeting ​border crossings with Ukraine in other countries, including Poland,” he continued.Tusk cites CIA warningTusk said he had also received what he described as “a fairly precise report directly from the CIA regarding possible events in the coming months,” which he said matched warnings he had issued for months about Russian provocations.He also urged Poland and the rest of Europe to prepare for a range of scenarios, not only along the Ukrainian front but also across the eastern flank, echoing his previous warnings that Russia may attack NATO.Moldova crossing struck two days earlierOn Wednesday, Moldova accused Russia of deliberately Tudora-Starokozache border crossing and using false claims about weapons shipments to Ukraine to justify the strike and civilian deaths. Other Topics of Interest Business Centers Struck in Kyiv as Russia Escalates Drone Campaign Preliminary reports suggest damage in the capital’s Obolonskyi and Solomyanskyi districts. Russia’s defense ministry confirmed the attack, saying Moscow had struck logistic facilities that were allegedly being used to transport military cargo to Ukraine.The incident followed a series of Russian attacks on Moldovan-Ukrainian crossings in August.Moldovan President Maia Sandu accused Russia of deliberately sending some of the drones into Moldova’s airspace.“Judging by the trajectory of those drones, we can say which are sent intentionally and which are there by chance,” Sandu said, adding that in both cases, the drones violate the country’s airspace, Sandu said on Aug. 17.“And the only one who is guilty, the only party that is guilty of these things, is the Russian Federation, which started this war,” she continued.Poland sees little hope for recent Ukraine peace talksTomasz Siemoniak, Poland’s minister overseeing the country’s special services, has met with CIA Director John Ratcliffe over fears that Russia may attack NATO.Siemoniak confirmed the meeting with Ratcliffe on Tuesday, which was held at the agency’s headquarters near Washington.Ratcliffe had traveled to Moscow on Aug. 25, in his first visit to Russia during his tenure in the agency, where he held talks with Sergei Naryshkin, head of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), and Alexander Bortnikov, director of the Federal Security Service (FSB).Although further details of the talks were not made publicly known, Politico reported on Aug. 26 that Ratcliffe warned Putin against attacking a NATO member, with the discussion centering on the Baltic states – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Putin was reportedly also warned against providing military and economic support to Iran, which Moscow views as an ally and has received Shahed drones from.US President Donald Trump dismissed the possibility of Russia attacking NATO on Aug. 27, while rejecting reports that Ratcliffe traveled to Moscow to warn the Kremlin against such a move. Separately, he downplayed the visit by calling it “semi-routine,” before saying that his administration was “working very hard to get that war ended.”On Sunday, Sept. 6, senior US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner visited Kyiv for the first time as Washington’s intermediaries, where where they held bilateral talks with President Volodymyr Zelensky and the American emissaries, followed by a multilateral session that included national security advisers from the UK, France, and Germany.The two also traveled to Moscow and held more than three hours of talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday evening, Sept. 5, subsequently having an informal working dinner.Despite the weekend meetings being described as substantial and productive, and despite the Kremlin signaling openness for further trilateral talks, Russia continues to conduct large-scale attacks on Ukraine, with the latest attacks killing seven and injuring at least 118 nationwide on Thursday.Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski, speaking in Latvia on Wednesday, said he was not optimistic regarding the prospect of peace negotiations, adding that Moscow has not softened its military aims and continues to reject ceasefire proposals. 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