POLAND: MIGRANT CAMPS HAVE EMPTIED
WARSAW, Poland
Polish authorities said Friday there are no more migrants camping along the Belarus side of the European Union’s eastern border, but attempts at illegally crossing into the bloc’s territory are continuing and becoming more aggressive.
Ukraine, which also borders Belarus, said it would build a border fence and ditch, and hold military drills to forestall any attempted influx of migrants.
Around 50 migrants got through a fence into EU member Poland on Thursday, Anna Michalska, a spokeswoman for Poland’s Border Guard said. They included a family of five who said they wanted to stay in Poland, opening a procedure toward settlement. The others will have to return to Belarus, Michalska said.
Two other large groups of migrants were prevented from entering. Some migrants have thrown stones and used tree branches to hit Polish border guards.
Hundreds of Iraqis flew back home Thursday from Belarus after abandoning their hopes of reaching the EU.
Still, many migrants remained in a heated warehouse that Belarus made available this week near the border. They had been camping in a cold and wet forest since Nov. 8.
A charity collection was held in Michalowo, near Poland’s border with Belarus, with local people and some from across the country bringing clothes, blankets, food, toys and other items for hundreds of migrants who have entered Poland.
Konrad Sikora, deputy mayor of Michalowo, told The Associated Press the reaction
the charity is getting from all around Poland “is tremendous, it’s great, and I think we are helping those people really, really deeply.”
Some migrants, the most needy, are still in the damp woods, others are in hospitals or in guarded centers for foreigners, waiting for their international protection applications to be processed. In most cases, they are rejected.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg on Friday reiterated his warning that the situation on the border represents a security challenge.
“We are ready to provide support,” Stoltenberg told reporters in Berlin.