Poles most oppressed in Belarus, Andrzej Duda’s official says

May 2, BPN. Belarus is the country where Poles are the most oppressed and discriminated minority, a Polish presidential official has said.

Belarusian authorities imprison Poles for opposing the authoritarian regime of Alaksandr Łukašenka, and also demolish “Polish historical sites or graves of our heroes,” Andrzej Dera, secretary of state with President Andrzej Duda’s office, has told Polskie Radio.

“This is the policy pursued by Belarus. The difficulty is that we can’t help directly now, but we try to do it in a different way,” he said.

May 2 is Polish Diaspora Day. Jarosław Książek, a former Polish consul in Hrodna, told Polskieradio24 in an interview that Alaksandr Łukašenka’s regime violates all international conventions and civilizational norms in its treatment of the Polish minority.

At least 13 Polish memorial sites, including war graves, monuments and memorial signs, were vandalized or removed with approval from Belarusian authorities last in late October 2022. At least 14 such cases are known at present. Some incidents go unreported.

The campaign against Polish heritage in Belarus began last June. The monuments have fallen victim to the political standoff between Minsk and Warsaw, observers say.