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POLAND has warned it could be forced to take down Putin’s jet if it crosses its skies en route to crunch talks with Donald Trump.
Foreign minister Radoslaw Sikorski said Poland “cannot guarantee” the Russian president’s safety if he dares to fly over its territory.
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“I cannot guarantee that an independent Polish court won’t order the government to escort such an aircraft down to hand the suspect to the court in The Hague,” Sikorski told Polish broadcaster Radio Rodzina.
The chilling warning came as plans for the Trump-Putin summit hit fresh turbulence, with a key pre-meeting between their top diplomats abruptly cancelled.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio had been due to meet Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to hammer out a roadmap for peace – but the talks were mysteriously axed.
A White House official confirmed to NBC there were “no plans” for the two leaders to meet in the “immediate future”, sparking fears of a total breakdown in communications.
It comes as European leaders backed Trump’s starting point for Ukraine war negotiations.
One insider claimed Rubio and Lavrov had “widely differing expectations” over how to end the war – leaving the American side doubting whether any Trump–Putin summit could succeed.
Rubio is now “unlikely to recommend his president even attends a meeting with Putin,” the source added.
Trump had announced last week he would meet the Russian leader in Budapest after a “very productive” phone call – the first major step in his promise to end war in “24 hours”.
But even reaching Hungary could prove a nightmare for Putin.
The Kremlin chief is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) on charges of illegally deporting hundreds of Ukrainian children — a warrant that obliges member states to arrest him on sight.
Poland is a signatory to the ICC treaty – and Sikorski’s warning makes clear Putin would not be safe even in the skies.
“The aircraft will use a different route,” Sikorski added dryly, suggesting Moscow would need to find a detour if it wanted to avoid humiliation.
All EU countries are signed up to the ICC, though Hungary – under pro-Russian PM Viktor Orban – is in the process of withdrawing.
Budapest has already vowed to “ensure that Putin can enter Hungary, has successful negotiations here, and then returns home,” according to Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto.
The threat leaves Putin facing a gruelling detour to reach Trump – dodging NATO and EU airspace and effectively flying behind enemy lines.
Experts say the route could stretch to nearly 2,000 miles. doubling the flight time from Moscow to Budapest.
The most likely path would snake from Russia to Turkey, then Greece, across North Macedonia and Serbia before finally landing in Hungary.
Going over Montenegro and Serbia from the Adriatic Sea is another possible route, but either way it would be long, tense and politically fraught.
Former UK Defence Attaché to Moscow, John Foreman CBE, told The Sun: “The US will put enormous pressure on smaller, Orthodox, NATO countries in the Balkans to allow Putin through under diplomatic flight clearance.”
Security expert Anthony Glees said Putin’s path to Hungary will be “very circuitous – and make him look stupid.”
“It’s very humiliating for President Putin, and indeed humiliating for Hungary,” Glees said.
“They appear to have been told by Trump that that’s where the meeting has to take place.”
He added the despot could even consider a secret “sealed train” journey from Moscow to Budapest to dodge the ICC’s reach.
Despite the ridiculous logistics, Putin may relish the attention, Foreman claimed.
“Putin will love spitting in their eye,” he said. “It will enrage some countries in NATO and the EU – but that’s the point of picking Hungary and Orban.”
Orban, who has long defied Brussels, proudly declared last week: “Hungary is the only place in Europe today where such a meeting could be held.”
The Hungarian leader has repeatedly sided with Moscow, blocked EU sanctions and vowed to veto Ukraine’s bid to join the bloc.
Earlier this year, he even announced plans to pull Hungary out of the ICC altogether – after hosting Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, who also faces an arrest warrant.
But Hungary remains bound by the ICC until the withdrawal is finalised next year – meaning technically, it’s still obliged to arrest Putin.
Adding to the danger, every single one of Hungary’s seven neighbours is an ICC member – and all but two are NATO allies.
That leaves Austria and Serbia as the only possible safe zones for Putin’s passage.
Even so, experts say NATO won’t shoot down his plane – but they “won’t be happy” about him crossing Europe either.
“NATO will decide that they should leave the plane intact,” Glees said. “But they won’t be very happy with it.”
The EU has banned all Russian aircraft from entering its airspace since the invasion began in 2022.
Each EU state would need to lift that ban for Putin to fly through – a decision that would cause outrage across the bloc.
Bulgaria, however, has hinted it may bend the rules, with Foreign Minister Georg Georgiev saying: “If the condition for this is to have a meeting, it is most logical for such a meeting to be mediated in every possible way.”
Bulgaria’s foreign ministry later said it had not received any official air travel request from Russia.
Trump insists the talks will go ahead “in an agreed upon location, Budapest, Hungary, to see if we can bring this ‘inglorious’ war to an end.”
But no date has been confirmed – and the Kremlin is playing coy.
Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: “Serious preparation is required. You have heard statements from both the American side and ours that this could take some time.”
Meanwhile, Moscow’s attacks on Ukraine have intensified since Trump and Putin’s last face-to-face meeting in Alaska two months ago.
At that summit, sources said little progress was made beyond “jovial hours in each other’s company.”
As the fighting rages on, Trump faces his toughest diplomatic test yet -coaxing Putin to the table while keeping Europe’s allies onside.
English (US) · 