Will the crisis on the border with Belarus escalate? The Lukashenko regime has a new strategy

The migration crisis on the Polish-Belarusian border began in the second half of 2021. Alexander Lukashenko’s regime lured foreigners with the false promise of easy passage to European Union countries. At that time, thousands of migrants were camping in Belarus, near the Polish border.

Despite the construction of a barrier on the border with Belarus, the Border Guard still reports on incidents, but their scale is now much smaller than initially. Will this change? According to RMF FM, currently hundreds, if not thousands, of foreigners are waiting in Belarus for the opportunity to get to Poland.

Crisis on the border with Belarus. Migrants crowd into studio apartments

According to the findings of the website of the mentioned radio station, foreigners stay mainly in Minsk, but they are also in larger cities west of the Belarusian capital. They are supposed to crowd several dozen people into small premises, often studio apartments, and wait for their turn to go to the Polish border.

Alexander Lukashenko’s regime is trying to take advantage of the entire procedure by attempting to destabilize the eastern border of the European Union. The organizers of people smuggling, as well as those who earn money from renting, are getting richer. The catering sector and private transport also count on profits. According to RMF FM, smuggling organizers usually rent private taxis and buses to foreigners to transport them to the border area.

Interestingly, in recent weeks the vast majority of foreigners detained after trying to illegally cross the Polish border have newly issued Russian visas. – This means that the main direction from which foreigners get to Belarus is Russia – summed up Konrad Szwed from the Border Guard Headquarters.