President: I Concurred with Duda on Need for Sustainable Peace in Ukraine

Strbske Pleso, April 1 (TASR) - A sustainable peace must be achieved in the war in Ukraine, the Slovak and Polish Presidents, Peter Pellegrini and Adrzej Duda, concurred at a news conference held during the Polish president's farewell visit in the High Tatra mountains on Tuesday. Pellegrini noted that there's no specific plan on the table for how to achieve such a peace. "There's need to seek a way to achieve a sustainable peace that will guarantee security for both Slovakia and Poland in the long term. Meetings at the EU level haven't brought any solutions yet, so we'll keep an eye on the negotiations between the USA, Ukraine and Russia," stated Pellegrini. He doesn't think that sending Slovak soldiers to Ukraine would be a guarantee of peace, and peace through force is not the right way, either. Some countries prefer huge loans and arms supplies to Ukraine, but Slovakia has doubts as to whether this is the path to peace, stated the Slovak president. In this context, both presidents also spoke about increases in their countries' defence spending. Poland has proposed spending 3 percent of GDP on defence, which is viewed by Duda as a realistic goal. Pellegrini stated that it's important to talk about the rate of increase as well. "This will be on the agenda of the summit at The Hague, and Slovakia is ready to discuss it," he said. He's prepared to continue negotiations on increasing Slovakia's defence capabilities across the entire political spectrum. "We agreed that we need more military production in Europe to be self-sufficient in defence; for example, when it comes to ammunition supplies. Among other things, we also spoke about the 'polonisation' of Korean tanks, which are especially effective in mountainous areas," added Duda. The presidents are expected to take a trip to Lomnicky Peak later on Tuesday. ko/df