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Refugees – Pressure on airlines is increasing
In the conflict over migrants on the EU’s external border with Poland, the state-owned Belarusian airline Belavia no longer wants to bring citizens of certain countries from Turkey to Belarus. At the request of the Turkish authorities, Belavia will no longer allow citizens from Syria, Iraq and Yemen to carry out such flights, the airline announced on Friday. According to an EU official, one-way tickets for flights from Turkey to Minsk will no longer be sold. Belavia will also no longer be able to use Turkish Airlines’ Middle East network to fly travelers via Istanbul to Minsk, it said. The acting German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said that one was in talks with all airlines that transported people to Belarus. “All airlines need to know who is guilty of complicity in criminal smuggling, who will have to face consequences, including sanctions for overflight rights or landing permits,” announced Maas. The Polish border guard tweeted that there had been 223 attempts to cross the border illegally. This would be a rather small number compared to the previous days. According to Lithuania, the presidents of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia want to meet in Vilnius on Monday to discuss the crisis. Poland’s President Duda will also be involved. The EU accuses Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko of organizing targeted illegal border crossings by migrants in retaliation for sanctions against his country. According to the EU, Lukashenko lets refugees from Syria and Iraq fly to Minsk in order to then bring them to the Polish and thus to the EU external border.
The Belarusian airline Belavia does not want to bring citizens from Syria, Iraq and Yemen to Belarus with immediate effect.