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Refugees on the Belarusian-Polish border (archive photo)
Photo: ARTUR RESZKO / EPA
Poland is taking tough action against the increasing number of people fleeing via the route from Belarus.
In the past 24 hours, border guards have arrested 14 suspected couriers who are said to have helped refugees cross the border.
Among those arrested were two Germans who were carrying 34 Iraqis in a delivery van, the border guard spokeswoman for the PAP news agency reported on Friday.
The other couriers were reportedly from Poland, Syria, Uzbekistan, Italy, Romania, Georgia and Iran.
Everyone is being investigated for aiding and abetting the organization of an illegal border crossing.
The EU and the government in Warsaw have accused the Belarusian ruler, Alexander Lukashenko, of bringing refugees from crisis regions to the EU's external border in an organized manner.
Lukashenko announced at the end of May that Minsk would no longer prevent refugees from continuing to travel to the EU - in response to tightened Western sanctions against the former Soviet republic.
According to Poland's border guards, there have been more than 12,000 attempts to illegally cross the border since the beginning of October.
In the Podlachie border region, more than 160 couriers who were traveling with refugees have so far been arrested.
Chancellor Angela Merkel accused Lukashenko of state trafficking in human beings on Thursday.
At the start of the EU summit in Brussels, she threatened the dictator with further economic sanctions on Thursday.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen spoke of a "hybrid attack".
She said, “No human life should be put at risk for political reasons.
And so I am sure that the Council will give a very strong and very cohesive response to this behavior in Belarus, which must be stopped. "
as / dpa