Belarus-Poland border crisis: Turkey wants to control flights - declaration against Minsk in the UN

The situation on the Belarusian-Polish border remains tense.

Turkey - a stopover for migrants - now wants to control flights to Minsk.

The news ticker.

• In order to prevent refugees from traveling to the EU's external border between Poland and Belarus, Turkey now wants to control flights to the Belarusian capital Minsk

  (see first report).

• In the UN Security Council, European countries, together with the USA, condemned the actions of the government in Minsk and described the strategy of the authoritarian ruler Lukashenko as "unacceptable".

  (see update from November 12th, 10:40 a.m.)

• This news ticker is continuously updated.

Belarus crisis: “more pressure” - opposition leader Tichanowskaya calls for “more courageous action” from Germany

Update from November 12, 10:52 a.m

.: The Belarusian opposition leader Svetlana Tichanovskaya has called on Germany to take more decisive action against those in power in her homeland. "We are continuing to communicate with the German government (...) so that they make Belarus a priority in foreign policy, so that they can be more courageous in their actions," said the exiled opposition politician in an interview with

on Thursday.

She was “grateful for any support” from every country, but at the same time “much more could be done”, she said, and called for “more economic and political pressure on the regime”.

She further stated: "Because of the bureaucracy, decisions are made rather slowly, perhaps also out of uncertainty." However, the migration crisis "did not start yesterday," but new sanctions are only now being discussed, she added.

She was also convinced that Lukashenko would not carry out his threat after gas supplies to the EU were to be stopped.

Tichanovskaya thinks this is a "bluff".

Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier received Tichanowskaya on Thursday against the background of the refugee dispute between the EU and Belarus at Bellevue Palace.

+

The Belarusian opposition politician Tichanovskaya called for “more courageous action” against Lukashenko.

Before that, she met Federal President Steinmeier.

© Wolfgang Kumm / dpa

UN Security Council: European countries and USA condemn Lukashenko's government

Update from November 12th, 10:40 am

: The USA and several European countries have condemned the government's actions in Minsk with a view to the refugee crisis on the border between Belarus and the EU.

In a joint statement, they accused Belarus of "orchestrated instrumentalization of people" at an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council on Thursday.

The aim of the ruler Alexander Lukashenko's action is to "destabilize the external border of the European Union".

Belarus also aims to "destabilize neighboring countries" and "divert attention from its own growing human rights violations," said the joint statement by the US, France, Estonia, Ireland, the UK and Norway.

Lukashenko's strategy is "unacceptable" and must result in a "strong international reaction".

Dmitri Polyansky, Russia's deputy UN ambassador, spoke of a “masochistic tendency” of his Western colleagues because it was very courageous to raise this issue, which was a total disgrace for the EU, in front of Russia.

In addition, not all problems need to be addressed by the Security Council, said Poljanski.

Migrants at the Polish border - Turkish authorities want to control flights to Belarus

The Belarusian-Polish border is currently a hotspot for a new flow of refugees towards Europe.

With the hope of reaching European countries, thousands of migrants are waiting in icy temperatures on the EU's eastern external border.

On several occasions, larger groups have tried in vain to break through the fence system that Poland uses to prevent them from crossing the border.

The government in Warsaw and the EU are accusing the authoritarian Belarusian ruler Alexander Lukashenko of targeting people from crisis regions in order to smuggle them into the EU. Lukashenko has so far rejected the allegations and threatens the EU, among other things with the shutdown of gas lines. The EU has launched new sanctions that could be formally adopted early next week.

Now is a decisive step from Turkey, which could have a positive impact on the situation at the EU's external border. Under pressure from the European Union, Ankara now wants to control flights to Belarus in order to prevent the onward journey of migrants mainly from the northern part of Iraq, an EU official confirmed to

. Previously, an investigation showed that most of the migrants' route to Belarus runs through Turkey.

According to the EU official, one-way tickets for flights from Turkey to Minsk will no longer be sold. Belavia, the state-owned airline of Belarus, will also no longer be able to use Turkish Airlines' Middle East network to fly travelers via Istanbul to Minsk, it said. The civil aviation authority of Turkey announced on Friday that people with Syrian, Iraqi and Yemeni passports are no longer allowed to buy tickets and board until further notice.

The state-owned Belarusian airline Belavia also announced on its website that citizens from the three countries were no longer allowed to board their planes according to a decision by the Turkish authorities.

Passengers affected by the ban could return their tickets at the point of sale and have their money refunded.