Thu 18 November 2021:
As G7 foreign ministers pushed Minsk to end the migrant issue on Thursday, the Polish army detained dozens of migrants who crossed the Belarusian border, accusing Belarusian special forces of orchestrating the operation.
Around 2,000 people, mostly from the Middle East, are thought to be living in terrible conditions near the Poland-Belarus border, desperate to enter the European Union.
Belarus is accused by the EU of orchestrating the crisis in retribution for sanctions imposed on the ex-Soviet republic. Minsk and its primary partner, Russia, have denied the allegations and chastised the EU for refusing to accept migrants attempting to enter the border.
“We call on the regime to cease immediately its aggressive and exploitative campaign,” the EU and foreign ministers of the G7 global powers said.
But Belarus has said it wants to de-escalate the crisis.
Natalya Eismont, a spokeswoman for Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, claimed on Thursday that the country presently has roughly 7,000 migrants.
She stated that Belarus will return 5,000 migrants, while German Chancellor Angela Merkel will work with the EU to establish a “humanitarian corridor to Germany” for the remaining 2,000 migrants at the border.
There was no immediate reaction from Germany.
Meanwhile British Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said he would stand “shoulder to shoulder” with Poland during a visit to a military base in northeast Poland that hosts a NATO battlegroup.
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