People reaching the border with Poland in Belarus are receiving automatic messages from the Polish government telling them to turn back. Thousands of people from the Middle East, Asia and Africa have recently been seeking to cross illegally.
“The Polish border is sealed. BLR [Belarus] authorities told you lies. Go back to Minsk,” reads the message, first reported by news website wPolityce. The text message is in English and contains links to more detailed information available in that language as well as Polish, Russian, Arabic and French.
The message is sent by Poland’s Government Security Centre (RCB), which is used by the authorities to issue automatic emergency warnings. It is received by people whose phones connect to Polish mobile networks along the border.
At the start of this month, the entire area placed under a state of emergency for 30 days by President Andrzej Duda due to the surge in attempted crossings that began in the summer. Duda indicated yesterday that he intends to extend the state of emergency for another 60 days.
On Monday this week, the interior minister revealed that around 1,200 people are currently being held in guarded centres after being detained for illegally crossing the border. Thousands more people have been prevented from doing so by the Polish authorities.
The government has argued that its tough measures at the border, which have included constructing a razor wire fence, are necessary to prevent the uncontrolled entry of people as part of a “hybrid attack” against the European Union by Belarus.
Critics, including NGOs, have argued that the Polish authorities are illegitimately turning away – and in some cases pushing back – people who have made clear their intention to seek asylum. They claim that the state of emergency, which bans media from visiting the border, is intended to hide what is happening there.
As the weather has worsened over September, border crossers have been facing increasingly difficult conditions. Five dead bodies have been discovered on the Polish side of the border since last week. There have also been numerous reports of migrants facing physical violence and theft at the hands of the Belarusian authorities.
Main image credit: Agnieszka Sadowska/ Agencja Gazeta
Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.
