September 17, Pozirk. Several Belarusian MPs made incendiary anti-Polish statements during the September 16 ONT show broadcast ahead of National Unity Day marking the unification of Western and Eastern Belarus on September 17, 1939.
The date also marks the anniversary of the Soviet Union’s attack on Poland launched under a secret agreement with Nazi Germany to partition Poland after the start of the Second World War.
Aleh Ramanaŭ, head of the pro-government Biełaja Ruś party, accused Poles of pushing territorial claims for western Belarus that used to be a part of the Second Polish Republic between 1921 and 1939.
Belarusians will have to deal with the Polish irredentism for decades to come as it is rooted in Poles’ mentality, he charged without presenting any evidence.
“Their idea ‘Polska od morza do morza’ [Poland from the Black Sea to the Baltic Sea], it is part of their mentality,” he said.
Poland intended to deploy its troops in Belarus in 2020 and remains an “American tool to weaken Europe,” claimed Aleh Hajdukievič, of the parliamentary Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs.
He accused Warsaw of warmongering and planning an attack on Belarus. “We are watching, listening to their stories . . . but we will never believe them again. If they knew today that they could attack Belarus and get away with it, they would burn [everything] and kill [Belarusians],” Hajdukievič said.
MP Mikałaj Buzin in charge of human rights, national relations and media at the House of Representatives, described Poland as the West’s battering ram against Russia and Belarus.
