The official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, compared the fences that Lithuania and Poland are building on the border with Belarus with the wall of the 45th US President Donald Trump on the border with Mexico.

According to her, at one time the initiative of the American president was harshly criticized.

“How Westerners scoffed at the construction of a wall on the US-Mexican border in every way.

It turned out #ThisOther with all the consequences.

When the “who needs” wall is a wall, all the high standards with which they previously tried to destroy the “wrong” wall can be broken against it, - wrote Zakharova in her Telegram channel.

In addition, as the diplomat noted, in an effort to prevent illegal immigrants from entering their territory, some EU countries use forceful methods, physically expelling asylum seekers from their country or preventing them from entering their territory. 

“Now it is clear why Europe is so calm about the branch of hell that is being unfolded by the hands of Warsaw and Vilnius on the eastern border of the EU with Belarus.

This deliberate step fits into the general concept of the EU migration policy.

There is no place in it for European law, nor for the Geneva Convention on the Status of Refugees, nor for simple human compassion, ”said the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

  • Wall on the mexico-american border

  • AP

  • © Gregory Bull

Lithuanian initiatives

Meanwhile, earlier in Lithuania it was reported that the total length of the wall on the border section will be 500 km.

According to preliminary estimates, the engineering structure will cost the country € 152.5 million (12.6 billion rubles).

According to the deputy head of the State Border Guard Service under the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Lithuania Vidas Machaitis, depending on funding, construction work can last from one to two years.

At the same time, Vilnius hopes that the EU will cover the costs of building barriers.

As the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Lithuania Agne Bilotaite said at the end of September, illegal migration is a problem for the entire European Union, therefore, money for combating it should be allocated from the general budget.

In this matter, Lithuania has enlisted the support of Poland, which also intends to build a fence on its border.

"Both sides unanimously agreed that it is necessary to find EU funding for the construction of the fence," said a press release from the Lithuanian Ministry of Internal Affairs following the meeting between Agne Bilotaite and Deputy Head of the Polish Ministry of Internal Affairs Bartosz Grodetski.

  • Migrants in Lithuania

  • AP

  • © Mindaugas Kulbis

At the same time, the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, following the results of the October EU summit in Brussels, said that the European Commission would not allocate funds for the construction of any barriers, despite the demands of the Eastern European countries.

“The EU has firm principles, we will never finance the construction of walls and barbed wire fences on our borders,” said von der Leyen.

However, Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda called the statement of the EC head not a final decision, stressing that the country will continue to seek financial support for construction from the EU.

In the meantime, the government of the republic has extended the mandate of the army's participation in guarding the border with Belarus for three months.

Poland fights back

But if in Lithuania the construction of the fence is in full swing, then in Poland the decision to erect the wall was officially made only at the beginning of November.

The corresponding law was signed on November 2 by the President of the country Andrzej Duda.

According to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Poland, Mariusz Kaminski, the fence 5.5 m high and 180 km long will be equipped with high-tech equipment - surveillance cameras and motion sensors.

“I want to emphasize that we use the most modern, electronic border management methods.

It will not be a purely physical and engineering barrier, it will be a whole perimeter surveillance system, ”Kaminski said.

In addition, the state of emergency continues to operate in Poland, which was extended by President Andrzej Duda for 60 days.

After all, as the Prime Minister of Poland Mateusz Morawiecki said, the country "does not want to be the subject of a cruel game that is being played from Minsk and Moscow."

  • Twitter

  • © Mariusz Kamiński

Found the culprit

It is worth noting that accusations against Russia and Belarus that they are allegedly to blame for the invasion of migrants are heard in the European Union quite regularly.

Thus, the EU representative to the UN Olaf Skoog previously stated that Minsk politicizes the topic of migrants.

At the same time, earlier the Foreign Ministry of Belarus announced Minsk's readiness to hold consultations on the situation with migrants.

However, as the head of the department Vladimir Makei noted, the EU categorically refuses to do this.

Similar claims in connection with the influx of illegal immigrants, but already against Russia, were expressed by the Minister of the Interior of the Federal Republic of Germany Horst Seehofer.

According to him, the government in Minsk does not act "without the knowledge or approval of Moscow."

In Moscow, these accusations were called "complete absurdity."

During a press briefing, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stressed that the West is experiencing all the problems with migrants because of its military operations in Iraq, Libya, Syria and Afghanistan.

  • RIA News

  • © Press Service of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation

The country's President Vladimir Putin also spoke about the non-involvement of the Russian Federation in the situation on the borders of the European Union.

“Russia has nothing to do with it, this is a sovereign affair of Belarus and its neighbors,” the president stressed.

Politicization of the situation

According to experts, the problem of migration, which Lithuania and Poland are now facing, has shown their lack of independence as state entities.

After all, earlier, as noted by Vladimir Olenchenko, senior researcher at the Center for European Studies at the IMEMO RAS, Belarus took on the solution of refugee dropout issues.

“The current leaderships of Poland and Lithuania are unable to pursue a balanced policy.

They do not know how to regulate relations within the country, or relations with other countries, or, in general, to build understandable tactics in relation to European and global problems.

Therefore, the current situation is evidence of incompetence and lack of skill to cope with more or less serious challenges, "the analyst explained in a conversation with RT.

In turn, the expert of the Russian International Affairs Council Sergei Utkin noted that the current situation with migrants should be considered in a broader context - in the context of the political contradictions that arose between Belarus and the European Union.

“After all, the existing problem is connected with the lack of dialogue between the EU countries and Minsk.

At the same time, the latter proposes to start consultations to resolve the situation, but the EU is convinced that Belarus is trying to manipulate him and, not wanting to succumb to this, rejects all proposals, "the expert said in a commentary on RT.

At the same time, he suggested that to some extent the current problem even plays into the hands of Warsaw and Vilnius.

“After all, they now have a common image of an actual enemy against whom they can rally and, at the same time, earn political points.

And, perhaps, additional funding from the EU will be knocked out, ”the analyst emphasized.

However, as Olenchenko recalled, Brussels considers this situation to be more regional, believing that it should be dealt with on the ground.

In addition, according to him, the flows of migrants are not so significant compared to 2014-2015.

Meanwhile, Sergei Utkin drew attention to the fact that now in Europe there is a division of migrants into "us" and "strangers" when it comes to those who make their way through Belarus, and Afghans who are taken out by air.

“Most of the specialists are being taken out of Afghanistan, who can be useful to the EU.

After all, not everyone is taken away from the republic, but they assess the extent to which this or that Afghan helped the coalition forces.

Those who run through Belarus are not of particular interest to European countries.

However, this absolutely does not justify the methods used by individual countries in relation to these refugees, ”Utkin concluded.