Ukraine war to decide ‘third pillar’ of global order: Polish FM

WARSAW: The war in Ukraine will decide whether Europe or Russia becomes the “third pillar” of a new global order, Poland’s foreign minister Radoslaw Sikorski said on Thursday, two days after the conflict entered its fifth year.

Ukrainian negotiators were scheduled to meet US officials in Geneva on Thursday to try to find a resolution to the conflict, which began with Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.

NATO member Poland shares borders with both Russia and Ukraine, and its government has been a trenchant critic of Moscow throughout the conflict.

“This war will determine which actor becomes the third pillar – alongside the United States and China – of the new global balance of power,” Sikorski said in his annual speech to parliament where he outlines the country’s global priorities.

“Will it be Russia or European Union?”

READ MORE: Ukrainian attack on Russian fertiliser plant kills seven

He warned that countries moving away from expected norms would be “unequivocally dangerous” for his country.

“The international order is shaking to its foundations,” he said.

Sikorski was echoing comments from other politicians in recent months highlighting a changing global order.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said earlier this year that the world order was “in the midst of a rupture”, and French President Emmanuel Macron has warned that the order was in danger of “disintegration”.

Sikorski also used his speech to outline a staunchly pro-EU vision, as a survey suggested about one quarter of Poles support leaving the bloc.

“There can be no free, prosperous and secure Poland without a strong European Union,” Sikorski said.

“Either we remain united, or the bigger ones will devour us.”

In Moscow, he said, “they rejoice at every display of anti-European hysteria”.

And on the financial benefit, he claimed that Poland had received roughly 170 billion euros more than it had contributed during its two decades of EU membership.

If Poland were to leave the bloc, economic output would crumble, wages would fall and meat and dairy exports would decline by around 45 to 50 percent.

“And that in a scenario of a smooth separation from the Union, not a brutal rupture,” he said.