Polish PM sums up first day of EU summit

The European Peace Facility, the issue of Ukrainian children abducted by Russia and the Belarusian regime's crackdown on dissidents dominated the agenda of the Polish prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, on the first day of an EU summit on Thursday.

Morawiecki provided a recap of the talks between EU leaders on Thursday night.

The first issue concerned the European Peace Fund that finances military purchases to help Ukraine defend itself against the Russian invasion.

So far, Poland has received about PLN 200 million (EUR 43 million) from the facility, the prime minister said. "But there is very good news, as we have been promised here that in about two to three weeks' time we'll have EUR 200 million more, so about a billion Polish zlotys that we'll spend on defence policy from European money," he added.

Morawiecki also said he advocated that the EU fund be bigger, "not EUR 3.5 billion, but significantly greater."

The EU summit started with a meeting with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and a discussion on the abduction of Ukrainian children by Russia, Morawiecki said.

"Poland and the European Commission are piloting the case, supporting Ukraine in looking for those children," Morawiecki said. "Kidnapping children, abducting children, de-nationalising children simply resembles the worst Nazi German practices from the times of World War Two," he continued.

Morawiecki also brought up the issue of "the brutal practices towards political prisoners" of the Belarusian strongman, Alexander Lukashenko. "I made it very clear that the Polish national minority is particularly persecuted by Lukashenko," he said.

Morawiecki advocated more sanctions on Belarus as the country "may not serve as a mechanism of circumventing sanctions imposed on Russia."