Poland asks US to help identify rocket debris found in forest

By Jo Harper

WARSAW (AA) - Poland has asked the US to help it identify rocket debris found near Bydgoszcz last week, local media reported on Thursday.

"The Polish side is examining materials that will make it possible to determine where the rocket found in the forest near Bydgoszcz came from," RMF FM radio station said, adding that the US is already cooperating with Polish investigators.

Lt. Gen. Tomasz Piotrowski, the operational commander of the types of armed forces, informed that "intensive investigations, checks, intensive dialogue between various types of institutions are underway."

The aim of the Polish-American investigation is to clarify the route the rocket traveled, as well as determine when exactly it happened.

Last week, wreckage of an unidentified military object was found in a forest near Zamosc, 15 kilometers (9 miles) from Bydgoszcz, northern Poland.

Initially, local media reported that the wreckage belonged to a World War II shell, but Piotrowski last Friday said the object could be related to events of mid-December last year, when Russia launched missile strikes on Ukraine.

Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said that on Dec. 16, NATO F-35 planes and Polish planes were put on alert to track the trajectory of a missile that appeared on the territory of Poland. The missile was reportedly not found at the time.

A high-ranking Polish official told journalists that the wreckage was from a Russian Kh-55 missile.

RMF earlier reported, without citing sources, that the object could be part of an air-to-surface missile and most likely belonged to Poland's army.