Poland’s government is preparing a bill that will partially replace the state of emergency introduced on the country’s border with Belarus amid a deepening migrant crisis. The current measures are due to expire at the end of this month.
The amended law on the protection of the state border will limit movement in the area but is likely to see journalists allowed in. It will also introduce changes to the border guard, providing officers with additional means to deal with the crisis and scrapping the current age limit for recruits.
In response to a spike in attempts to cross the border from Belarus, a localised state of emergency was introduced in 183 municipalities within around 3 kilometres of the border at the beginning of September, initially for 30 days.
It was then extended for a further two months, meaning that it will cease to operate at the start of December. The Polish constitution prevents the state of emergency from being extended again, while the crisis on the border has escalated significantly in the last week.
As tensions grow around the border crossing in Kuźnica Białostocka, where journalists from international outlets have been reporting from the Belarusian side, Poland’s government is facing calls to also allow journalists into the exclusion zone.
"Illegal immigrants have been assembling at the border crossing in Kuźnica since the morning," says the Polish border guard.
"An attempt to break through the border by force is being prepared. Everything under the supervision of the Belarusian authorities." https://t.co/GOigLWfEWb
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) November 15, 2021
Over the past months, media outlets have mostly relied on official information from the authorities on both countries without being able to independently verify the information.
Aid organisations have also been prevented from providing medical and humanitarian aid near the border where a number of migrants have already frozen to death.
The bill, which is set to be debated in parliament tomorrow, will introduce amendments “to ensure the effectiveness of actions taken by the border guard” and is made necessary by “the continuing crisis at the Polish-Belarusian section of the state border”.
It will allow the border guard to prohibit people from entering “a specific area of the border zone” and to “determine exceptions to this ban,” according to the bill’s wording.
“We won’t solve this crisis overnight – it could take many months,” Mariusz Kamiński, the interior minister, told RMF FM. “That is why, after the end of the state of emergency…we will introduce an amendment to the law on the protection of the border.”
The legislation will “de facto extend what there is currently” but take “various remarks into account,” Kamiński added. These will include allowing journalists to report from the border, provided that they follow certain rules.
“Journalists will be able to be at the border, but on each occasion, this will have to be agreed with the border guard. We will be flexible, we will proceed sensibly, and all national stations and newspapers will be able to take this opportunity,” he promised.
The legislation will be processed urgently, said Kamiński, who urged the opposition to also support the bill. “In Lithuania and Latvia, parliament makes decisions on such matters unanimously,” he added.
The October extension was opposed by MPs from the centrist Civic Coalition (KO) and The Left (Lewica), the two largest opposition groups, and passed with a majority of 237 in the 460-seat chamber following a stormy session.
The bill also proposes to allow border guard officers to carry backpack-mounted gas canisters, which Maciej Wąsik, the deputy interior minister, called “more effective, better and in some situations essential”.
Additionally, it would make changes to employment regulations applying to the border guard, including scrapping the current age limit for recruits, which is 35.
This change has “long been called for by the border guard”, which is the last force where it continues to apply, said Wąsik, quoted by TVN24. He called it a “sensible solution”, noting that the border guard also needed experts, including those aged over 35.
Main image credit: Kancelaria Premiera/Irek Dorozanski/DWOT (under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Ben Koschalka is a translator and senior editor at Notes from Poland. Originally from Britain, he has lived in Kraków since 2005.
