Calls grow for pressure on Belarus as Polish border situation worsens

The situation at the Polish-Belarusian border was threatening to spiral out of control on Wednesday, hours after two large groups of migrants that had been stopped from moving further westwards reportedly broke through into Poland.

Polish officials then reported that members of the Belarusian security forces had fired their weapons, apparently in an attempt to scare the massed migrants. 

Poland is refusing to let the migrants onto its territory and has sent hundreds of reinforcements to the border in recent weeks. It has also erected a barbed wire fence, in an effort to stop any attempts by migrants to break through.

Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko demanded on Tuesday that they be allowed through into Poland. He said in an interview they mainly wanted to settle in Germany, not Poland.

The European Union has accused Minsk of helping migrants trying to reach the bloc’s external borders in Poland, Latvia and Lithuania, as retaliation for Western sanctions on Belarus for political repression.

Amid the chaos at the border, several dozen people managed to destroy fences close to the villages of Krynki and Bialowieza and to cross the border, Polish news agency PAP reported late on Tuesday, citing the Bialystok local radio station.

In a phone call with Putin, Merkel told the Russian president that it was inhumane for Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to use migrants - whom many say have been pushed to the border as a way of lashing out against the EU - for his own ends, according to Merkel’s spokesperson.
Warsaw (dpa), 
10 Nov, 2021