Tusk calls for respect between allies after US-Poland spat over Starlink satellites
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Polish prime minister tells ‘friends’ to cast aside arrogance after his foreign minister and Marco Rubio trade barbs online

Reuters in Warsaw

Mon 10 Mar 2025 07.32 EDT Last modified on Mon 10 Mar 2025 18.07 EDT





Donald Tusk, Poland’s prime minister, has called on “friends” to respect their allies and not be arrogant in a post on X that mentioned nobody by name but was published a day after an extraordinary social media spat between top officials in the US and Poland over Starlink satellites.

Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, accused Poland’s foreign minister, Radosław Sikorski, of “making things up” and suggested on Sunday he was ungrateful, in a strong rebuke after Sikorski said Ukraine may need an alternative to Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite service if it becomes unreliable.

Tusk had earlier replied: “Thank you, Marco, for confirming that the brave soldiers of Ukraine can count on the vital internet service provided jointly by the US and Poland.”

Sikorski had been told to “be quiet” and labelled a “small man” by Musk after he suggested that Poland, which says it pays $50m a year for Ukraine’s Starlink services, may need to find another provider if Musk’s service was deemed unreliable.

The US government has already revoked some access to satellite imagery for Ukraine and , piling pressure on Kyiv as Trump seeks a swift end to the war, which is now in its fourth year after Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Shares in the Franco-British satellite operator Eutelsat soared by as much as 650% last week amid speculation the company could replace Starlink in providing internet access to Ukraine.

Musk, a high-profile figure in Donald Trump’s administration, said in a post on his X social media platform early on Sunday that Ukraine’s “entire frontline would collapse if I turned it  off”.

In a series of posts on X on the subject, that lasted through the day, Musk said later he would not turn off Starlink in Ukraine.

“To be extremely clear, no matter how much I disagree with the Ukraine policy, Starlink will never turn off its terminals … We would never do such a thing or use it as a bargaining chip.”
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