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The reinforced border between Poland and Belarus in Kuznica
Photo: WOJTEK RADWANSKI / AFP
In order to prevent migrants sent by Belarus from entering the country, Poland set up a restricted zone along the common border last summer.
According to Warsaw, the restricted area is now to be reduced again.
Interior Minister Mariusz Kamiński announced that access restrictions for the 400-kilometer-long and three-kilometer-wide strip would be lifted "on July 1."
However, access to the border area in a strip of less than 200 meters remains prohibited.
The country is also sticking to its plans for a border fence with Belarus to keep refugees away from Polish territory.
Poland set up the restricted area in September 2021 to prevent people seeking protection from entering the country from Belarus.
Since then, refugee helpers and journalists have also been banned from entering the Polish-Belarusian border area.
At the time, the West accused the Belarusian government under ruler Alexander Lukashenko of deliberately causing a refugee crisis on the border with Poland by allowing migrants, mainly from the Middle East, to come to Belarus and later smuggling people towards Poland.
Minsk denied the allegations.
Gigantic border fence for 353 million euros
The Polish government is sticking to its controversial plans to build a border fence with Belarus: the Polish-Belarusian border is 418 kilometers long, of which 186 kilometers are overland and the rest through lakes and rivers.
Since the beginning of the year, Poland has been erecting a 5.50 meter high fence with motion detectors and cameras on the land sections of the border.
Construction should be completed by the end of June.
The Polish government wants to equip the five-meter high barrier with surveillance cameras and motion detectors.
The costs for this are estimated at around 353 million euros.
For years, Poland has been accused of an anti-migration policy that also includes "pushbacks," i.e. the illegal deportation of asylum seekers from the Middle East, for example, to the border.
However, since the beginning of the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine, Poland has taken in more than four million refugees from the neighboring country.
mrc/dpa/AFP
