Conflict with Belarus: Morawiecki calls for rigorous border protection

Poland’s Prime Minister Morawiecki has called on the Europeans to exercise rigorous border protection – as his country is currently proving. In the evening, Chancellor Merkel phoned the ruler Lukashenko.

In the Belarus crisis, Poland calls on the EU to resolutely protect its borders. “If we are not able to keep thousands of immigrants away now, then there will soon be hundreds of thousands, millions, who are coming to Europe,” said Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki of “Bild”. His country is currently proving at the border fence with Belarus that effective border protection is possible. “Hardly anyone gets through, even though thousands try every night and every day.”

According to him, Germany in particular should have a special interest in protecting the EU’s external border on the Mediterranean Sea and in the east from immigration. With the actions of the outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel in the refugee crisis of 2015, Morawiecki went tough. “That was a dangerous policy for Europe and for the world,” he criticized. “It endangered the sovereignty of many European states and created an artificial multiculturalism.”

According to official information, Poland has now deployed more than 20,000 security guards in the region to prevent illegal entry.

Merkel is on the phone with Lukashenko and Morawiecki

In the evening, Chancellor Merkel telephoned the Belarusian ruler Alexander Lukashenko again. Government spokesman Steffen Seibert and the Presidential Office of Belarus agreed on this.

Merkel emphasized the need for humanitarian care and return opportunities for those affected to take place in cooperation with the United Nations refugee agency and the International Organization for Migration (IOM), said Seibert. In addition, it should work with the EU Commission. The Belarusian side expressed itself similarly.

According to information from the dpa news agency, Merkel also said at the meeting of the Union parliamentary group in Berlin that the talks were about humanitarian aid in the region. Merkel made it clear that it was not a bilateral problem between Germany and Belarus. It is about Belarus and the European Union.

Criticism after the first conversation

Merkel and Lukashenko had only made a phone call on Monday, which met with sharp criticism in Poland. Poland’s government spokesman Piotr Müller said the conversation was “not a good step”. It was “in a way” the acceptance of Lukashenko’s choice. President Andrzej Duda also underlined that his country will not accept any agreements that are made without his participation.

In the meantime, Merkel also exchanged a phone call with Morawiecki about the worrying situation at the border. Merkel underlined the “full German solidarity with Poland”. The EU accuses Lukashenko of organizing migrants from crisis regions to the EU’s external border in order to put pressure on them.

Poland’s parliament approves border protection law

Poland’s parliament has meanwhile approved a law to protect the border, which is intended to temporarily restrict freedom of movement and freedom of the press in the border region. A clear majority of MPs voted for the amendment by the national-conservative ruling party PiS. After the vote in the Sejm, the first chamber of parliament, the bill now goes to the second chamber, the Senate. He can make suggestions for changes.

Opposition representatives criticized that the PiS government wanted to permanently block the access of critical journalists in view of the crisis surrounding migrants on the Polish-Belarusian border. At the beginning of September, Poland declared a state of emergency for a strip of three kilometers along the border with Belarus. Non-residents, journalists and aid organizations are not allowed into this zone.

Ukraine sends more than 8,500 security guards to the border with Belarus

According to its ambassador in Germany, Ukraine fears that refugees could be sent from the border between Belarus and Poland to the Ukrainian border. “There is a risk that smuggled migrants will be diverted from the Belarusian-Polish border to the border with Ukraine,” Andrij Melnyk told the newspapers of the Funke media group.

Kiev has therefore sent more than 8,500 police officers, national guards and border guards to the border region. “This is just the beginning,” added the ambassador. “A state of emergency may also be declared. We are prepared for anything.” The border between Ukraine and Belarus is more than a thousand kilometers long and consists of swamps and forests that are difficult to control. “We are concerned that this area could be used for possible provocations,” said Melnyk.

Migration researcher suggests dual strategy in Belarus crisis

Migration researcher Gerald Knaus proposed a dual strategy in the crisis on the border between Poland and Belarus. “We have to let the people in the border area enter Poland and check their asylum applications,” Knaus told the “Rheinische Post”. At the same time, the EU countries would have to send the signal that the community “will not accept any more people after a certain deadline”.

This would make a humanitarian control possible, it said. Those who still come can only enter a safe third country, no longer the EU. “The EU would of course have to work hard to achieve this,” said Knaus. For example, after appropriate preliminary negotiations, Ukraine could offer the EU to accept people for proceedings from Poland from a deadline. “It has to offer a strategic advantage for the country to offer something like this to the EU, otherwise it won’t happen,” said Knaus. “The situation in the border area between Belarus and Poland is extremely dramatic. The Polish security forces are sending the people back. This is illegal because Belarus is not a safe third country,” explained Knaus.

President Alexander Lukashenko manipulates the refugees and puts them in a “life-threatening situation by driving them to the border”. In doing so, he is blackmailing the EU. However, the EU countries support Poland’s “illegal policy”: “This is a policy that ultimately relies on violence.”