Poland says Russia knows what will happen if Putin tries to reach Budapest through its airspace

Poland warned Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday not to try to transit its airspace en route to a summit in Hungary with US President Donald Trump, with Warsaw saying it could be forced to implement an international arrest warrant for the Kremlin leader, Reuters reports.

Trump announced last week that he plans to meet with Putin in the Hungarian capital Budapest as part of his efforts to mediate an end to the war in Ukraine.

The Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Putin in 2023, accusing him of illegally deporting hundreds of children from Ukraine, a war crime. Russia does not recognize the jurisdiction of the ICC and rejects the charges.

“I cannot guarantee that an independent Polish court will not order the government to escort such a plane to the ground to hand over the suspect to The Hague,” Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski told Radio Rodzina on Tuesday.

How can Vladimir Putin get to Budapest for the meeting with Trump

The mandate issued by the ICC obliges the court's member states to arrest Putin if he steps onto their territory.

“I think the Russian side is aware of this. Therefore, if the summit takes place – hopefully with the victim of the attack – the plane will use a different route,” Sikorski said.

Hungary, whose Prime Minister Viktor Orbán maintains cordial relations with Russia, said it would ensure that Putin could enter the country for the summit and return home afterwards.

To avoid crossing Ukraine, however, the Russian delegation would have to fly through the airspace of at least one European Union member state. All EU states are members of the ICC, although Hungary is in the process of withdrawing from the international court following a decision this year.

At the beginning of April, Hungary also defied the arrest warrant issued by the ICC on behalf of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, receiving him on an official visit to Budapest.

Bulgarian Foreign Minister Georg Georgiev told the EU Foreign Affairs Council in Luxembourg on Monday that his country is ready to open its airspace to Russian President Vladimir Putin's plane if he decides to fly to Budapest.

Poland was among Kiev's staunchest supporters after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.