Belarus uses them to take revenge on the West
Immigrants from the Middle East are chess pieces in the new Cold War
Lukashenko refuses to stop the cold war with the European Union.
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Putin: Lukashenko is a difficult negotiator.
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With the onset of winter, thousands of migrants from Iraq, Syria and Yemen are still stranded in a frigid region on the border between Belarus, an ally of Russia, and Poland, a member of the European Union.
Their goal is very clear: to reach wealthy EU countries, such as Germany, France and Belgium, as quickly as possible.
But the tension created by a terrifying new Cold War means that these desperate refugees from the Middle East are being played as pawns in a geopolitical game.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko sees migrants as a tool. He brought them to an eastern European country to punish the West, which is imposing sanctions on Minsk, Belarus, for its crackdown on protesters in 2020, and the arrest of opposition figure Roman Protasevic last May.
Lukashenko's policy appears very simple: the more sanctions the EU imposes on his country, the more migrants he will send to the bloc.
don't back down
But it is clear that the European Union does not intend to back down.
On Monday, Brussels agreed to impose more sanctions on Belarus.
Although final details are still being discussed, it is expected that these sanctions will target 30 people and entities, including the country's foreign minister and Belarusian Airlines (Belavia). Lukashenko, for his part, threatened to retaliate by cutting gas supplies to Europe.
Certainly, such a measure will have a significant impact on the entire continent, especially since Russia has already reduced gas supplies to the European Union, which led to a significant increase in energy prices.
But given that the Yamal Europe natural gas pipelines that pass through Belarus are owned by the Russian energy giant Gazprom, Lukashenko will not be able to stop the gas transportation, unless he gets the green light from Moscow.
If the Kremlin wants to heat up events and agree to Lukashenko's decision, power outages in many European countries will become a given.
News reports indicate that the European Union is preparing to impose sanctions against the Russian airline "Airflot" due to the situation on the Belarusian-Polish border.
Some reports indicate that EU leaders believe that Airflot is transporting migrants from the Middle East to Minsk, and from there trying to cross the Polish border.
But the Russian airline vigorously denies that it is doing this work.
And if Brussels imposes these sanctions on the Russian company, the Kremlin could respond by preventing the flights of European Union countries from passing through Russia's skies, which will lead to an increase in the prices of air tickets to many countries.
The threats to impose sanctions against Aeroflot appear to have been taken seriously by the Turkish airline, as this company confirmed that it no longer transports Iraqis, Syrians and Yemenis on its flights from Minsk, except for people with diplomatic passports.
Indeed, after the European Union threatened Iraqi Airways to stop its flights to Belarus, most migrants began to go to Minsk via Istanbul.
Now that the Turkish route has stopped, the Belarusian authorities are planning to increase the number of flights from several Middle Eastern countries to Belarus, one of the republics of the former Soviet Union.
The West expects to continue to try to prevent such measures, but if Lukashenko remains bent on retaliating against EU sanctions, he may bring in migrants from Central Asia, or perhaps from Russia's Chechnya, to move refugees to the EU's border with Belarus.
baffles
Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia are building barriers along their borders with Belarus. Recent history shows that such measures can be quite effective. In 2017, the government of Hungary laid a barbed wire along its border with Serbia. The result was fewer attempts by migrants to enter the European Union illegally. But Lukashenko does not stop the continuing cold war with the European Union, he could direct refugees southward towards Ukraine. The asylum seekers would then try to go to Poland, Slovakia, or even Hungary on their way to wealthy European countries.
From Belarus's point of view, what the European Union is doing in the Middle East has destroyed many countries, and these refugees are forced to seek a better life elsewhere.
That is why the Belarusian authorities keep reminding the European Union that they adopt the principle that if a person flees a war zone and arrives in Germany, France, or any other EU member state, he or she can apply for refugee status.
double standards
The Russian foreign minister accused the EU of having double standards, as he claims that when refugees were arriving in Europe via Turkey, the EU paid huge sums to keep them in Turkey.
In other words, Lavrov is publicly suggesting that the West should pay Lukashenko money to stop sending refugees to the EU.
This option seems illogical. From the point of view of the European Union, any concession to Belarus, even if it is in the form of financial aid or the lifting of sanctions, will be interpreted as a sign of weakness on the part of the European Union.
That is why the West refuses to negotiate directly with Lukashenko, and has focused on increasing pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Outgoing German Chancellor Angela Merkel called the Russian president twice within one week to try to resolve the refugee crisis.
But any agreement that can be reached between the West and Russia must include Lukashenko as well. He is not a puppet of Putin, although his country depends a lot on Russia, as both leaders have a history that includes many contradictions and disagreements, especially with regard to energy measures. Lukashenko has always made every effort in the struggle to preserve the sovereignty of Belarus.
As Putin himself said, the Belarusian president is a very difficult negotiator.
And the European Union is learning that very hard.
• Lukashenko's policy seems very simple: the more sanctions the European Union imposes on his country, the more immigrants he will send to the EU.
• The Belarus authorities keep reminding the European Union that they adopt the principle that if a person flees a war zone and arrives in Germany, France, or any EU member state, he or she can apply for refugee status.
Nikolai Mikovic ■ political analyst from Serbia
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