Refugee dispute with Belarus: Lithuania wants to declare a state of emergency in the border region

In view of the worsening situation on the EU's external border with Belarus, Lithuania wants to impose a state of emergency in the border region for one month. The government of the Baltic EU country submitted a resolution to the parliament in Vilnius for approval on Tuesday. The cabinet is following a proposal by Interior Minister Agne Bilotaite. The state of emergency should therefore apply from midnight along the border with Belarus and five kilometers inland and in the migrant shelters in Kybartai, Medininkai, Pabrade, Rukla and Vilnius. Riots broke out there on Monday - tear gas was used in a camp.

"We are watching what is going on on the Polish-Belarusian border, and of course that means we can expect similar invasions and attacks," said Bilotaite. She justifies her proposal to declare a state of emergency to respond to this by strengthening the security of the borders. The Lithuanian Interior Minister wanted to discuss the situation at the border with her German counterpart Horst Seehofer on Tuesday.

In view of the influx of refugees from Belarus to the Polish border, Seehofer himself asked the EU states to support Poland and Germany.

"We have to help the Polish government secure the external border," he told the Bild newspaper (Tuesday).

“That would actually be the task of the EU Commission.

I now appeal to them to take action. ”Meanwhile, the editors rbb24 Recherche reported (Tuesday), referring to information from the Federal Police, that 308 criminal proceedings against smugglers in connection with illegal migration via Belarus had been initiated in Germany since August 1st .

German police officers on the border with Belarus?

Seehofer said that all EU states have to stand together here because the Belarusian ruler Alexandr Lukashenko “, with the support of Russia's President Vladimir Putin, is using the fate of people to destabilize the West.

Poland or Germany cannot cope with this on their own. ”Seehofer welcomed the construction of the border wall by Poland.

“I also say that we need the structural security of the borders.

We also have to publicly support the Poles.

We cannot criticize them for protecting the EU's external border with permissible means. "

There should be no use of firearms, but there are other possibilities.

He accused Lukashenko of having "purposefully created and used" images of refugees and children fleeing at the border.

The parliamentary state secretary in the Federal Ministry of the Interior, Stephan Mayer (CSU), discussed the use of German police officers to secure the Belarusian-Polish border.

"We are offering Poland every help to repel the attack on the border with Belarus," he told the Bild newspaper.

"Germany could also send police forces to Poland for support very quickly if Poland wanted to."

SPD General Secretary Lars Klingbeil also called for more commitment from the EU on Tuesday.

He told the Bild-Zeitung that the states of the European Union had to work together to “ensure that no more new refugees came”.

"We have to clearly communicate in the countries where they come from that they have no chance of coming to Germany this way."

According to the editors rbb24 Recherche, two thirds of the smugglers identified who tried to bring migrants illegally across the German-Polish border are foreign nationals.

Among the arrested were 69 Iraqi, 67 Syrian, 36 Ukrainian, 24 Georgian and 22 Polish nationals, it was said.

Criminal proceedings have been initiated against them.

In the current year, according to the Federal Police, 8833 unauthorized entries related to Belarus were found.

The migrants had previously traveled to Belarus and from there entered the EU via Poland.

Polish security authorities said they had prevented several hundred people from Belarus from breaching the border on Monday, according to the rbb. The refugees tried to cut the barbed wire and get into the EU on foot. The Polish border guards used pepper spray and thwarted the breakthrough. In freezing temperatures, thousands of migrants spent the night of Tuesday in the border region between Belarus and Poland. Apart from a stone's throw, the local Polish police authority announced on Twitter on Tuesday morning. Belarusian state media released photos and videos of people gathered around campfires and children lying in sleeping bags on the ground in the forest area.

The Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki wrote on Twitter on Tuesday that he saw the EU in danger due to the influx of thousands of migrants on the Polish border with Belarus.

"Today the stability and security of the entire EU is at stake," said Morawiecki.

The government in Minsk, meanwhile, denied allegations of deliberately causing the influx of migrants at the border.