EU stops 103 illegal migrants at Belarus border

December 2, BPN. The EU has not allowed 103 migrants to enter illegally from Belarus over the past day.

The Lithuanian State Border Guard Service did not report illegal border crossings for the second consecutive day, but said that their Latvian colleagues thwarted 50 attempts. Since the beginning of the year, Lithuania has recorded 10,783 illegal attempts to cross the border.

The Polish Border Guardsaid that 53 nationals of Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria tried to illegally cross the border from Belarus. The border guards arrested a Georgian for complicity in illegal migration. 

The migration crisis at the Belarusian-EU border dates back to the spring of 2021. It escalated on November 8, 2021 when thousands of migrants set up a camp near the Polish border. The Baltic states and Poland accused Belarusian authorities of creating the trouble, while the latter blamed it on the West.

Migration figures had dropped significantly by the time Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, but have risen more recently.