“An information campaign, which will be based on data collected by the Border Guard and soldiers protecting the Polish border with Belarus, will be addressed at the countries which migrants who are trying to illegally cross the Polish border from Belarus come from,” Minister Radosław Sikorski said in Białystok, north-eastern Poland, on Monday.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs will collaborate with the Interior Ministry and the armed forces to compile information about the situation at the border “in order to inform foreign countries about what has been going on at the Polish-Belarusian frontier.”
Sikorski highlighted that a significant majority of detained migrants possess Russian visas, while Belarus has waived visa requirements for certain countries. He noted that these actions are part of a strategy to lure desperate individuals into attempting unlawful entry into Poland, under false pretenses of easy access.
“This has been taking place to encourage these poor people, in countries with a migration threat, to try their luck. They are being misled, as they cannot come here just because they want to,” Sikorski said.
The campaign will include film footage from the border to demonstrate the difficulties and dangers of illegal crossings. Sikorski expressed hope that this visual evidence would deter potential migrants from risking their lives and falling into the hands of people smugglers linked to the FSB and GRU.
In 2021, in response to EU sanctions, Belarusian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka began encouraging migrants to come to Belarus with false promises of easy passage into the EU via Poland and Lithuania, aiming to destabilize the EU.
Poland has since constructed a border fence equipped with advanced electronic surveillance to curb the influx of migrants coming through Belarus. Despite these measures, some illegal crossings continue to occur monthly.
