Paweł Soloch’s remarks came in a TV interview on Thursday, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
On Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a partial mobilisation of 300,000 reservists to fight in Ukraine and warned the West he was ready to use nuclear weapons to defend Russia.
Putin’s ‘verbal escalation’
Soloch, who leads President Andrzej Duda's National Security Bureau (BBN), told private broadcaster Polsat News: “This [partial mobilisation] signifies a kind of defeat for Putin, but we are definitely seeing an escalation.”
Soloch said that this was “a verbal escalation,” especially Putin’s “very vague threat of using nuclear weapons.”
The official stated that such threats should be treated as “highly unlikely to materialise.”
According to Soloch, the partial call-up won’t affect the situation on the frontline “in the coming weeks,” and it remains to be seen to what extent the move “will be effective in the military sense.”
He also said “in the coming days,” the partial mobilisation “doesn’t mean a heightened threat against Poland.”
‘Poland must push for bigger NATO presence on eastern flank’
“Whereas politically, also in terms of the messages being sent to the outside world, this is definitely an escalation,” he added.
Soloch urged: “Following this mobilisation, we must press for an increased allied [NATO] presence on the eastern flank.”
“This is an additional reason for NATO to have a bigger presence in the East than to date,” the presidential official stressed.
Thursday is day 211 of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
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Source: PAP, polsatnews.pl