Defying EU criticism, Donald Tusk took to the X platform on Monday to say that the government “must regain 100% control over who enters and leaves Poland.”

Arguing that the right to asylum had been used by Moscow and Minsk as a tool of hybrid war, he said: “Our right and our duty is to protect the Polish and European border.

“Its security will not be subject to negotiation. With anyone.

“It is a task to be performed. And my government will perform this task.”

Warsaw has accused Belarus’s Alexander Lukashenko regime of collaborating with Russia’s Vladimir Putin to orchestrate a migration crisis at the EU’s external border since 2021.

Naszym prawem i naszym obowiązkiem jest ochrona polskiej i europejskiej granicy. Jej bezpieczeństwo nie będzie przedmiotem negocjacji. Z nikim. Jest zadaniem do wykonania. I mój rząd to zadanie wykona.

— Donald Tusk (@donaldtusk) October 14, 2024

At a parliamentary meeting, Polish Defense Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz added: “At a time of a hybrid attack by Putin and Lukashenko, whose target is Poland, there is no room for half-measures. Decisive action is necessary.”

Migration has been high on Poland’s agenda since 2021, when large numbers of migrants, mostly from the Middle East and Africa, started trying to illegally cross the border with Belarus in what Warsaw and the European Union said was a crisis orchestrated by Minsk and its ally Russia.

Russia and Belarus have denied responsibility.

Reacting to Tusk’s comments, a European Commission spokesperson said that “member states have international and EU obligations, including the obligation to provide access to the asylum procedure.”

“It is necessary to develop a European solution that will be resistant to the hybrid attacks of Putin and Lukashenko but will not harm European values.”

The plan put forward by Tusk has caused controversy not only in Europe but also among activists defending human rights.

Amnesty International said that “the unjustified suspension of the right to asylum, even temporarily, is something unacceptable and contradicts the Geneva Convention and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, among others.”

“Any person fleeing persecution or at risk of suffering serious harm in his or her home country has the right to seek international protection or so-called asylum.”