{"id":147720,"date":"2025-07-22T20:10:38","date_gmt":"2025-07-22T17:10:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/147720\/"},"modified":"2026-03-09T20:10:49","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T20:10:49","slug":"minsk-denies-training-asylum-seekers-to-climb-over-border-fence","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/147720\/","title":{"rendered":"Minsk denies training asylum seekers to climb over border fence"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

July 22, Pozirk<\/em>. <\/strong>The Belarusian foreign ministry has pushed back against the suggestion by a Lithuanian border post head, Algis Kisielius, that asylum seekers might be trained in Belarus to climb over the border fence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Vilnius officials \u201centhusiastically look for mythical [training] camps, very real questions remain unanswered,\u201d for example, about the \u201ccruel treatment of migrants\u201d or \u201cthe role of Lithuanian citizens in organizing illegal crossings,\u201d the ministry\u2019s spokesman, Rus\u0142an Varanko\u016d, said on its Facebook page.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On July 20, Kisielius suggested that foreigners might be trained in Belarus to quickly climb over the Lithuanian border fence. According to him, it takes 15 people 1.5\u20132 minutes to get over the fence to the other side. Groups of undocumented migrants bring ladders long enough to trample down the barbed wire on top of the fence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the first 201 days of this year, Lithuania prevented 941 attempts to illegally cross the border from Belarus\u20142.8 times more than in the same period last year, Pozirk <\/em>estimates based on data from the country\u2019s border service. For comparison, Lithuanian border guards recorded 1,002 such attempts throughout 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The flow of people desperate to enter the European Union surged in spring 2021 after Alaksandar \u0141uka\u0161enka, angered by EU sanctions, had indicated that Minsk would not prevent asylum seekers from Africa and Asia from using Belarus as a route to the EU.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later, \u0141uka\u0161enka claimed that foreigners were traveling to the EU because they were \u201cinvited there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last year, the neighboring EU countries thwarted at least 36,291 irregular border crossings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Belarus\u2019 western neighbors call the migration crisis a \u201chybrid attack\u201d orchestrated by Minsk and Moscow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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