On Thursday, Polish officials reported a shift in migration patterns across the country’s border with Belarus, with Africans who visited Russia for the first time making up the majority of those seeking to illegally enter Poland through other people from the Middle East.
The government said the African migrants included other people passing through Russia, a close friend and neighbor of Belarus, as well as others who had been in Russia longer.
In an email to The Associated Press, the Polish government described the migration as part of a “hybrid operation aimed at destabilizing NATO’s eastern flank. “
Since last summer, migrants and asylum seekers have crossed Belarus into Poland and Lithuania, and to a lesser extent Latvia. The 3 nations are located east of the territory of the European Union and NATO.
Countries have tried to discourage crossing attempts, detaining migrants and pushing them back to Belarus. Poland recently completed a metal wall along 185 kilometers of its land border with Belarus.
Human rights organizations have criticized Poland and Lithuania, saying migrants come with other people fleeing persecution and have the right under foreign law to seek asylum.
European leaders accuse Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko of creating a new synthetic migration direction to destabilize the EU. Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki’s government said it believes Russia also bears some responsibility, given its alliance with Lukashenko.
At first, most of the other people who tried to enter the EU from Belarus were Afghans, Syrians, Kurds from Iraq and others from the Middle East. migration slowed down.
It never stopped entirely, but the scenario was overshadowed by the much larger number of Ukrainian refugees who were welcomed into Poland after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February.
The Department of Homeland Security inside the prime minister’s workplace told the AP that existing border guard statistics show that the vast majority of migrants crossing illegally at the Poland-Belarus border now come from sub-Saharan Africa.
They “have Russian visas and it is Russia where they come to Belarus,” he said.
“[They] have visas issued to examine or work, however, according to testimonies collected through border guards, they have never had such plans and have only used visas to cross the migratory route. At the same time, the Russian administration is facilitating the visa process,” the government said. “Among immigrants, there are also other people who have been in Russia longer.
“The movements taken through Russia and Belarus verify that the artificially created migration direction is controlled and coordinated through those two regimes and, in the long run, we hope that the hybrid operation aimed at destabilizing NATO’s eastern flank will only intensify,” he added.
Data from border guards that in July there were 914 attempts at illegal passage from Belarus to Poland.
L. A. Times Must
Receive the top news of the day with our Today’s Headlines newsletter, which is sent out each and every morning of the week.
You may get promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
Subscribe to access
To follow