Poland will send 2,000 troops to its frontier with Belarus, twice the number requested by the Border Guard, to stem illegal crossings and maintain stability, reported Reuters on Wednesday, August 9th. The Polish Government fears that neighbouring Belarus and Russia will make more attempts to destabilise the country in the near future.
According to Deputy Interior Minister Maciej Wąsik, Russia and Belarus are once again actively trying to push migrants into the European Union through the Polish border. “We are talking about an operation organised by Russian and Belarusian special services, which is becoming more and more intense”, Wąsik said, noting that the situation is not as chaotic as it was two years ago.
The number of migrants attempting to cross the Belarusian-Polish border illegally is on the rise. The head of the Border Guard, Tomasz Praga, said that 19,000 people had tried to cross the border already this year, up from 16,000 in the whole of last year. The Border Guard announced on Tuesday that they had intercepted 112 migrants—citizens of fifteen countries, including Nepal, Senegal and Yemen—over the past 24 hours.
The European migration crisis partly shifted to this part of the continent two years ago, when migrants started showing up at the borders of Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia, EU countries all bordering Belarus. President Alexander Lukashenko and his government have been accused of organising flights to Belarus from the Middle East for foreigners wanting to enter the European Union. After arriving in the capital, Minsk, they are escorted to the borders of the EU by Belarusian authorities. In 2021, 40,000 border crossing attempts were recorded in Poland; the year before only 122. Lithuania and Poland have both built barriers on their border with Belarus to stem the flow of migrants, and Latvia has also begun constructing a fence.
There are already 2,000 soldiers accompanying the 5,000 border guards patrolling the border, but Maciej Wąsik warned that the migration pressure is growing. The crossings, he said, were being organised by Belarusian border guards, who use tools to damage the border fence to allow migrants to cross. Bottles, stones, and branches have recently been thrown at Polish border guards. Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki previously suggested that fighters from the Russian Wagner mercenary group could also facilitate illegal migration from Belarus, or could even pose as migrants themselves and enter the EU.
“We still need to be prepared for all kinds of possible provocations, especially now when we see the news about the Wagner mercenaries stationed in Belarus”, said Latvian President Edgar Rinkēvičs, who visited his country’s border with Belarus and Russia on Tuesday. He stated that the “significant amount” of provocations from Russia and Belarus has led Latvia to enhance its border surveillance.
Wagner fighters have appeared near the Polish border in recent weeks and Belarus has launched military exercises near Poland and Lithuania, sparking fears that Russia is seeking to destabilise the Eastern flank of the EU and NATO with the help of its ally Belarus. Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that “any aggression against [Russia’s] Belarusian allies will be considered an attack on Russia itself” and would be “answered with all means at our disposal.”
