MOSCOW, November 9. /TASS/. It is the EU countries themselves that have created difficult living conditions in the Near and Middle East, and then invited migrants to these regions resulting in tension along the border with Belarus and EU members, Deputy State Secretary of the Union State of Belarus and Russia Alexei Kubrin reported on Tuesday at the videoconference "Russian-Belarusian relations in 2021: Union State programs, new challenges, and integration directions."
"It is not a desire made up by Belarus to invite migrants from third countries so that they will enter the EU," Kubrin said. "The EU countries have issued invitations, prior to that they took an active part in creating the very difficult situation which today exists in the Near and Middle East. Now they are attempting to foment tension on the border".
According to him, the Concept of the Union State’s migration policy was adopted just in time. Against the background of increased migration flows, the concept should, in particular, ensure the cooperation of relevant services of Belarus and Russia, Kubrin noted.
On Monday, several hundred migrants arrived on the Belarusian-Polish border, some of them trying to enter Poland by breaking through a barbed-wire fence, while Polish law enforcement officers used tear gas to repel them. Since the beginning of 2021, over 30,000 migrants have tried to cross the Belarusian-Polish border. Poland declared a state of emergency in regions bordering Belarus, banning entry to outsiders.
More than 4,000 illegal migrants from Asia and Africa have been detained at the Lithuanian-Belarusian border since the beginning of 2021. This is 50 times more than in the whole of 2020. Vilnius believes that the migration crisis was encouraged by Minsk, and calls it a "hybrid action" against Lithuania for the support the Belarusian opposition.