By Syed Faisal Ali and Nuaman Ishfaq Mughal
Islamabad: Poland remained the worst affected country after the war imposed by Russia on Ukraine. More than 18 million people had moved from Ukraine to other European countries and about 1 million to 1.5 million of those stayed in Poland as refugees. This was stated by Ambassador of Poland to Pakistan Maciej Pisarsk in an exclusive interview to mark a year since Russia’s full-scale invasion on Ukraine.
Ambassador Maciej Pisarski said Poland had provided multifaceted support to Ukraine as it was the main logistic hub for distribution of economic and military equipment, including aid to refugees on humanitarian grounds. He went on saying that Poland spent approximately 1.5% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for support towards Ukraine. “Some experts estimated that 77% of the population of Poland was involved in different forms of helping the Ukrainian refugees,” he said.
The ambassador further said that Poland learned from the models of different countries in dealing with refugees’ crisis. “We have studied the Pakistani experience in hosting refugees, but in being a borderline country in more general terms,” he said.
Commenting on tensions with Russia, the ambassador stated that Poland was not in war with Russia. “We don’t and we are not intending to be. We are just responding to the crisis. We wish the war had not happened. It wasn’t our choice. It wasn’t our decision. We just have to do everything possible that the aggression is not successful,” he said.
When asked about cooperation between Pakistan and Poland, the ambassador said that Pakistan and Poland were witnessing positive developments in bilateral relations especially in sphere of trade and investment. “When it comes to investment, we are mostly talking about gas exploration and production in Pakistan. We have Polish companies who have been involved in gas exploration and production projects for 25 years. One of our gas companies has successfully started gas production in Sindh province. We have so far spent $300 million dollars for gas production.”
On question of Pakistan’s position on the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war, ambassador Pisarski said that on humanitarian front, Pakistan was supporting them in war.