Poland’s foreign minister said Wednesday he is trying to determine which way President-elect Barack Obama is leaning on U.S. missile defense plans in Europe.

Radek Sikorski is meeting with Democrats this week, including former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. Obama tapped Albright to meet foreign leaders as a representative of his transition team at last week’s global financial summit. Sikorski also plans to meet U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Thursday.

“I think what we now need is a sense of where the new administration is going,” he said. “We think that this transition time is important for our interests because we signed with the current administration an agreement on missile defense and obviously we want to know where the wind is blowing on that.”

Poland and the Czech Republic have signed a deal with the United States to allow parts of a U.S. missile defense system on their soil, but neither parliament has approved the plan. The Czech parliament appears to be more skeptical, but Sikorski said he would be optimistic of approval in Poland if the newly elected Obama administration signals the project will be continued.

The U.S. plans have roiled relations with Russia. Moscow has threatened to move short-range missiles close to Poland’s borders and target Warsaw and Prague.

Obama has not yet indicated whether he will pursue the plans that call for a radar in the Czech Republic and interceptors in Poland. He said this year during his election campaign that the system would require much more vigorous testing to ensure it would work and justify the billions of dollars it would cost.

With or without the interceptors, the United States is set to deploy a separate short-range Patriot anti-missile system in Poland next year that will include a small garrison of U.S. troops, a move that Poland pushed for in the deal. Sikorski said that the U.S. presence will improve Poland’s security.

“The working assumption is that on the whole, countries with U.S. troops on them don’t get invaded,” he said.

The tension with Moscow, has led some Europeans to question the benefit of the missile-defense plan. The United States says the radar-missile project is aimed at countering a threat from Iran, not Russia.

Last week, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the system would not improve European security. He also proposed a pan-European security conference next year to include Russia, which has suggested that Europe’s security needs to be reorganized.

“A strategic discussion with Russia is a good thing if Russia wants to tell us what is on her mind and what would make her a constructive member of the broad West,” Sikorski said. “If the idea is to find a clever way to undermine NATO and get the Americans out of Europe, then we are against it.”