Poland to build 2.5 meter fence on Belarus border

Krakow, Aug 23 (EFE).- Poland will build a 2.5 meter high fence and enforce troops along its border with Belarus to stop the influx of migrants into the country, the defense minister said Monday.

According to a spokeswoman for the Polish Border Guard, 84 illegal crossings were reported on Sunday alone.

The migrants were from Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Yemen, of whom two were arrested.

In August, over 1,900 irregular entries into Poland were detected in what deputy interior minister Maciej Wasik described as an “avalanche of refugees”.

In response to the influx of migrants crossing illegally, the government assigned some 1,000 soldiers to patrol the Belarusian border.

Poland, Latvia and Lithuania issued a joint communiqué on Monday denouncing “the current (migration) crisis on the borders with Belarus systematically organized by the Lukashenko regime”.

The wave of irregular migrants in Poland mirrors the Lithuanian-Belarusian border, where an estimated 4,000 people have arrived in recent months.

Vilnius accuses Minsk of transferring migrants from Syria and Iraq to the border and of using illegal immigration as a “political weapon”.

The case of a group of up to 30 people who have been camping outdoors for 15 days in the Usnarz Górny area, on Belarusian territory just a few meters from the Polish border, has become a symbol of the Polish-Belarusian “migration war”.

Prominent activist Wladyslaw Frasyniuk said the migrants are being intimidated by Polish soldiers which he described as “inhuman and anti-Polish”. EFE