Lukashenko's regime arranged a real crisis in Lithuania, actively sending illegal migrants from Belarus to the EU territory

A four -meter fence for 1.5 billion euros, the tents in refugee camps and simplifying the deportation procedure, protests and tear gas, the Iraqets video blog from the camp in capchystis with detailed instructions on crossing the border - this is how the hybrid war of the Lukashenko regime with Lithuania, where the country's leadership is active, the dozens run daily daily Illegal migrants from the Middle East and from Africa. A state of emergency has been declared in Lithuania - the country cannot cope with such a stream of migrants.

The number of illegal migrants who crossed the border from Belarus has reached new records per day. Now there are almost four thousand of them, but this figure will increase again. Only over the past Sunday there were almost 300 illegal transitions, on the next day - almost the same. Most migrants arrived from Iraq, there are residents of other countries of the Middle East and West Africa. Many came without documents. And it is not always possible to believe their stories. They try in all ways not to give fingerprints, but Lithuanian law enforcement officers assure that all prints have been removed and entered into the EU database.

Official Vilnius called the growing streams of illegal migration to a hybrid attack against Lithuania by the Lukashenko regime, dissatisfied with the EU sanctions.

It was collected enough evidence that the flows of illegal migrants are organized by the Belarusian authorities, but the official Minsk does not respond to Lithuanian requests.

See again

EU border guards posted a video in which a departmental car from Belarus escorts migrants to the border with Lithuania

Protests on both sides

Migrants are protected as prisoners, they do not leave the resettlement places, and if they go, for example, to the nearest rural store, then only under protection. Locals are afraid of them, although they cannot always explain why. They organize protests on the resettlement of migrants and criticize the actions of the government. The main requirement is to place migrants anywhere, but only away from our houses.

Claces of protesters with the police occur, and the authorities also have to pacify protests inside the camps themselves with migrants.

There were already several such cases, sometimes everything ends peacefully, sometimes it comes to the use of special equipment.

The protesters lack civil consciousness and understanding of the situation, representatives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Defense are trying to agree with local residents.

For example, the “Union of Family Union”, which previously protested against the ratification of the Istanbul Convention, organized the marching marching march, joined the protests. Soyuz organized the campaign to “defend the Lithuanian border” near Druskininchinka and accused the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of causing his foreign policy to the influx of migrants: they say, if Lithuania had not supported democratic forces in Belarus and would not oppose the violation of human rights by the Lukashenko regime, then they would not have problems with illegal immigrants, they say and demand the resignation of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania Gabrielus Landsbergis.

“The negative position of the participants of the Great Machine of Family Protection in relation to the actions of migrants and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Lithuania is not surprising,” said the head of the Lithuanian Parliamentary Committee on the Protection of Human Rights, Thomas Vitautas Squareus. - Participants in the family march consistently opposed the ruling majority and take a position that fundamentally deny the basic human rights: they protest against the Law on Partnership and the Istanbul Convention. And it is not surprising that they believe that Lithuania should not support the human rights in Belarus and help those who oppose the dictatorial regime Lukashenko. I hope that in Lithuania there will be fewer and fewer supporters of such isolationist policy, Xenophobic and other human rights violations. ”

But not only local residents protest. On Monday, after long rains, tents at the training ground in the village of Rudninkai began to flow, and the protests of the camp residents broke out. The police used tear gas. The journalists were not missed to the migrants, and those standing at the fences, shouted when they saw the media representatives: “We are also people! Let the defenders of human rights see this! ”

Journalists failed to talk with protesting migrants. But all journalists heard screams that ambulance did not come to patients for a long time, that tents are not suitable for young children and people with disabilities. Some announced their intention to start a hunger strike, but there is simply nowhere to relocate people.

“We need to understand that we do not have the opportunity to provide migrants with tents of the highest quality-we received something thanks to the help of other countries, we took something from reserves. There is already as it is, it remains only to regret that the weather is such, ”the representative of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Lina Laurinite-Grigena told the BNS agency.

What to do with migrants

In the situation with migrants, Lithuania acts strictly within the framework of the law. It is impossible to return the arrivals to Belarus due to the fact that Alexander Lukashenko denounced the renewal agreement with the European Union. Deportation is possible only in those countries from where migrants came. But there are no direct flights from Vilnius to Baghdad, Tehran or Kabul. The same situation with citizens of Western Africa - Cameroon, Guinea, Congo - Lithuania does not have direct air traffic with them. There are flights to Istanbul, but the deportation procedure through third countries takes a long time, it is complex and time -consuming.

According to the law, the first EU country on the path of migrants is obliged to make sure that they do not travel freely inside the European Union until they clarify their status. If they are detained in another EU country, under international treaties, they will be returned to Lithuania, in Lithuania for them this should end either with the provision of asylum or a deportation. How can you find out that migrants arrived from Lithuania? First of all, by fingerprints from the EU database.

But now Lithuania decided on extreme measures.

The Minister of Internal Affairs Agnes Bilotai on Monday allowed border guards to return illegal migrants: to send them to the border checkpoints or diplomatic missions. Those who want to ask for political asylum should contact the checkpoint, the embassies and consulate.

“Persons who are deliberately trying to cross the state border in prohibited places should be considered as persons who intend to commit criminal activity - illegal crossing of the state border,” the minister said on Monday, explaining a new decision in the Dienos Tema News program to Lithuanian national television.

The minister said that international law allows the return of migrants if such a decision is temporary and if migrants are proposed an alternative opportunity to apply for asylum. How to realize it is not yet clear.

Growing numbers

Of course, Lithuania has already encountered issues of placing illegal migrants. In Pabrada, a small town of the Shvender district, Tajiks have been living due to Pandemia of Coronavirus for a year and a half. There are no direct flights from Vilnius to Dushanbe, and when they leave Lithuania, it is still unknown. Approximately 100 cases of illegal crossings of the border per year, which were recorded earlier, did not create special problems, and many migrants received refugee status. After 14-day quarantine, these people could go freely, no one kept them under guard. Some of them left Lithuania, without waiting for a decision on their status. And then, and now the goal of almost all illegal immigrants was not Lithuania, but Germany, the Netherlands, and the country of Scandinavia.

For example, a few years ago, two families with children from Syria escaped from the center of refugees in Ru. One family with two children was detained in Poland and returned to Lithuania, they were taken out by a Serb, who had a residence permit in Germany. The second family did not return to Lithuania. There were other cases of such shoots. All such stories are talking about several families, about small groups of people of 5-10 people. Now the score goes on hundreds and thousands.

Now, when 100 or more people cross the border not in a year, but every day, and everyone is asking for political asylum, the situation is completely different. Lithuania does not have enough specialists, because each case needs to be checked, and these are long legal procedures that have been consuming for months. While each application is being considered, these people should be provided with housing and food, they have a benefit and medical care. In addition, if the answer is negative, you can appeal, wait for more and more. In general, according to experts, all these procedures can last about a year. Given the dynamics of the growth in the number of illegal border crossings, the Lithuanian government is already planning that housing will be needed for 40 thousand people, at least.

The problem of resettlement

Due to the lack of places of illegal, they are placed on border outposts, even in the office. The problem should solve the tent camp in Rudninkai, but the active protests of local residents created additional problems to the authorities. First, the protesters blocked the road to the landfill, then broke into the protected territory and set fire to the tires. Several police officers were lightly injured. At the most aggressive protests, protocols on administrative violations were drawn up, and the Minister of Internal Affairs stated that these were specially organized protests and their assessment should be given in the Department of State Security of Lithuania.

But there, so far they have not found evidence of this. “The DGB (the Department of State Security) has not yet recorded the activities of anti-state organizations or anti-state armed groups, as is stipulated in the Criminal Code, as well as the conscious fulfillment of the tasks of some foreign state against the interests of Lithuania,” the official commentary for the BNS information agency says .

One way or another, at the military training ground in the village of Rudninkai it is planned to place about 1,500 migrants, several hundred already live there. And the protests of local residents do not subside.

Some of the inhabitants of Lithuania protest actively, some are not going to go to any protests, but feels anxiety and discontent due to new government expenses.

One of the residents of the small village of Vilnius district, 20 km from the border with Belarus, said that her mother, living abroad, called with a request not to go to the forest: “God with them, with berries, do not go, there is never a horror, what is happening!” She herself is not afraid, but is outraged by the fact that the authorities of Belarus send tens of thousands of illegal immigrants to Lithuania: “Let Lukashenko take them back, and here we are!?”

By the way, there were no attacks on local residents from the migrants.

The pensioner from the Varensky district shares his dissatisfaction: “It’s a shame, of course, as we have retired, there is no money, but there are whole millions to build a wall - and where? Where there had never been any border before! " Her native village of Rakai is on the border itself, surrounded on three sides is surrounded by Belarus.

Residents of the town of Dinickens of the Shalchininkai district are also surrounded by Belarus on three sides. No more than a thousand people live there. In July, they organized round -the -clock protests so as not to allow the authorities to place several hundred illegal migrants from them. The center for migrants will be near the school. The authorities promise that migrants will live behind a high fence under guard and will not go beyond the center. And some parents say they will not let the children go to school.

The director of the gymnasium Lolita Mikalauskene believes that it will be dangerous to let the children out of the building due to possible misunderstandings and provocations. She has already contacted the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Education.

Next to the nineteenishkes is one of the popular places for illegal transitions, an Iraqi video blogger, which releases daily videos with instructions on the suppression of the Belarusian-Lithuanian border, even tells about it. He himself is in a migrant camp in captchastis seven kilometers from the border with Belarus, but just nineties recommends a very convenient place for the transition.

It was there that a group of Iraqis once at dawn approached the protesters with a request to call border guards. Gently dressed illegal immigrants told the villagers that they had just crossed the border and want to ask for political asylum. Then they, along with the protesters, were waiting for the border guards for several hours-because of employment, they could not come quickly.

Wall for 1.5 billion euros

The length of the border of Lithuania with Belarus is 678.82 km, more than with all other neighboring countries. Faced with an influx of illegal migrants, Lithuania decided to build an additional fence from barbed wire on this border. At first, it was about a cost of 42 million euros, and in Brussels they stated that they would not finance the construction of the walls. A week ago, the construction of the wall had to be suspended: in Lithuania they do not produce a wire of the desired diameter. Negotiations on the purchase of this specific wire are carried out with Denmark and Slovenia.

One of the first Lithuania was decided to help Estonia, who is going to transfer 100 kilometers of wire for border fencing.

Now we are talking about a more expensive fence - and the EU is likely to help Lithuania.

The State Border Service (GPS) proposes to build a four -meter fence worth 152.460 million euros. The fence will be made of a welded rod grid, and at the top it will end with y-shaped rods, on which a cutting wire called “concert” will be attached. State security offers to establish 508 km of such fences on the border with Belarus.

The European Commissioner Ilva Johansson, who visited the Belarusian-Lithuanian border on Monday, confirmed that it was necessary to install a physical barrier on the border with Belarus.

New Laws and Human Rights

On Wednesday, the government will discuss a new package of bills on this issue. He will be considered by the Sejm at an extraordinary session next week. Partial changes to the legislation have already been made. They simplified the procedures for providing (and refusal) of political and humanitarian asylum, and also limited the freedom of moving migrants awaiting the decision of their status. Some politicians and human rights activists criticize these changes as human rights.

Lukashenko is trying to take revenge on Lithuania for her position on the protection of human rights in Belarus, where these rights are constantly rude. And now Lithuania herself faced problems related to human rights: among illegal migrants there are children, and adults who really need humanitarian assistance.

“It is important to note that among all persons who illegally crossed the border of the Lithuanian Republic are about 40 percent of vulnerable persons, including pregnant women, people with disabilities, persons undergoing torture, rape or physical and sexual violence, as well as minors without adults and other vulnerable groups of people,” says Thomas Vitautas Square. “Regardless of whether migrants in the Republic of Lithuania will receive asylum, it is necessary to provide the main humanitarian needs and comply with other international obligations in relation to migrants during the consideration of their petitions.”

Tatyana Op, "New Gazeta - Baltic"