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Poland and Europe must deal with Russia- US secretary of state

Other News Materials 25 September 2008 15:59 (UTC +04:00)

Poland as well as the rest of Europe and the United States has to deal with an increasingly aggressive Russia, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in statements published Thursday in the country's biggest daily.

Poland was a US key ally in the region, Rice said in a statement in the Wyborcza newspaper, and said Russian leaders were currently making bad choices, reported dpa.

Referring to Russia's recent conflict with Georgia, Rice said the Kremlin should respect the sovereignty of its smaller neighbors. Russia's actions, she said, are pushing it toward the path of isolation.

In a recent speech outlining US policy on Russia, Rice warned that Russia can't be allowed to intimidate its neighbours and act outside the rules of global affairs.

"We cannot afford to validate the prejudices that some Russian leaders seem to have, that if you pressure free nations enough, if you bully and threaten and lash out, they will cave in and forget, and eventually concede," she said.

Tensions between Poland and its former communist overlord reached new heights when Poland and the US signed a controversial deal to set up a missile defence base on Polish soil.

Poland also drew Russian anger by leading several former eastern bloc countries in a call for a tough European Union stance on Russia's brief conflict with Georgia.

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