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Poland will fortify its border with Russia’s ally Belarus as early as next week in response to what Warsaw says is a “ruthless hybrid war” waged by Moscow to destabilise its western neighbours.
Donald Tusk, the Polish prime minister who visited the Belarus border on Wednesday, announced the reintroduction of a buffer zone at the frontier to stop illegal migrants being pushed into the EU by Russia.
Tusk has made stronger border security a priority since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, recently pledging to spend 10bn zlotys ($2.5bn) to fortify Poland’s borders with Belarus and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad and make them “impregnable” to an attack.
Speaking alongside Tusk, defence minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz said Poland would send more soldiers and police to the border to respond to “a ruthless hybrid war”.
Warsaw is accusing Russia and Belarus of sponsoring a new attempt to push large numbers of African and Middle Eastern migrants into Poland illegally, one of several recent moves by Russia and its ally to test its land and maritime borders with EU states as the Ukraine war grinds on.
In 2021, the EU had already accused Belarus of launching “hybrid warfare” by facilitating flights for migrants to Minsk, from which they were then taken to the borders with Poland and the Baltic states and encouraged to attempt to enter the EU. Poland’s then government responded by building a 5-metre-high fence along part of its border with Belarus.
Tusk said that a 200-metre buffer zone could be enforced as early as next week along the Belarus border. “We are dealing with an organised, very efficient on many levels, action of breaching the Polish border and trying to destabilise the state,” Tusk told a news conference in Dubicze Cerkiewne, a Polish village next to the Belarus border.
The visit by Tusk and Kosiniak-Kamysz took place a day after a Polish soldier was stabbed by a migrant who was standing on the other side of the border fence. The attack “testifies to an organised action . . . against the security of those who protect our border, who take care of our security”, Kosiniak-Kamysz said.
Tusk’s government says 90 per cent of the migrants intercepted recently were carrying Russian visas. The government has also blamed Russia and Belarus for several other recent incidents. Tusk announced last week the arrest of nine people accused of preparing Russia-backed sabotage plots on its territory and possibly in other EU states, in particular arson attacks.
Poland is also among six Nato countries that are planning to develop a “drone wall” to help defend their borders with Russia after a series of provocations, including attempts by Moscow to redraw its maritime borders in the Baltic Sea.
Tusk’s pro-EU coalition took office in December. Ahead of next month’s elections to the European parliament, Tusk is also turning the tables on the opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party by accusing PiS of failing to guarantee Poland’s security during its eight years in power, including by allowing foreign agents to infiltrate the country’s judiciary.
This month Poland issued an arrest warrant for a Polish judge who defected to Minsk. Last year it was PiS that accused Tusk of being a stooge of foreign powers, including Russia. The then PiS government even sought to pass a law to prosecute Tusk and others for serving the interests of Russia, which sparked a strong public backlash and helped Tusk defeat PiS in the national elections.
The reinforced border security is reviving a debate over whether Poland is breaching its EU obligations to those migrants who are entitled to seek asylum and pushing them back illegally after they cross the Polish border.
The Polish authorities denied any illegal pushbacks, but a group of Polish non-governmental organisations issued a joint statement to denounce ongoing abuses.
“Prime Minister Donald Tusk talks about the need to protect the borders, we do not dispute this,” the NGOs said. “However, the actions of the services on the border so far have nothing to do with preparations for a potential attack from the east.”
Polish border guards “are hitting defenceless people seeking asylum, condemning them to the mortal danger of the Belarusian system”, the statement said.