Admission of refugees: Federal government rejects Lukashenko's demand

The German government has rejected the request of the Belarusian head of state Alexander Lukashenko to accept 2,000 refugees stuck on the border with Poland.

This is not a "solution that is acceptable for Germany or the EU," said government spokesman Steffen Seibert on Monday.

According to the state news agency Belta, Lukashenko had previously criticized the EU for refusing to hold talks about accepting the refugees.

The German government and the EU accuse Lukashenko of deliberately smuggling migrants to the borders of the EU states Latvia, Lithuania and Poland in retaliation for sanctions.

In the Belarusian-Polish border area, thousands of people, especially from the Middle East, are currently stuck in freezing temperatures.

Around 2000, the Belarusian authorities placed them in a logistics center near the border.

"An appalling humanitarian situation"

Lukashenko again rejected the allegation of smuggling on Monday. In return, he accused the EU of breaking its word. The German Chancellor Angela "Merkel has promised me that she will examine this problem at EU level," said the Belarusian President, who had spoken to Merkel twice on the phone last week. “But they don't do it.” Looking at the 2,000 refugees in the warehouse, Lukashenko said, according to Belta: “We have to ask the Germans to take them in”.

Last week, the Belarusian leadership referred to Merkel as a "humanitarian corridor to Germany". Seibert now said that Merkel had phoned Lukashenko "because there is a terrible humanitarian situation along the Belarusian-Polish border". "And because, of course, the attempt must always be made to find solutions in the interests of the people who persevere in very, very difficult circumstances."

Merkel also spoke with the head of the UN refugee agency UNHCR, Filippo Grandi, and the head of the UN migration organization IOM, António Vitorino.

The federal government is trying to "create access for these organizations so that they can help with the humanitarian care of migrants along the border".

But they should also be able to take action "when it comes to safe repatriation to their home countries," said Seibert.