{"id":156141,"date":"2025-09-18T14:02:54","date_gmt":"2025-09-18T11:02:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/156141\/"},"modified":"2026-03-10T12:05:06","modified_gmt":"2026-03-10T12:05:06","slug":"belarus-eu-irregular-crossings-surpass-2024-total-by-september-16","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/156141\/","title":{"rendered":"Belarus-EU irregular crossings surpass 2024 total by September 16"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

September 18, Pozirk.<\/em><\/strong> The neighboring European Union countries have not allowed 36,415 third-country foreigners to cross the border irregularly via Belarus since January, with attempts exceeding 36,291 recorded in all of 2024, according to Pozirk<\/em>\u2018s analysis of border guards\u2019 data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rise in irregular border crossing attempts might be one of the reasons Poland shut the border with Belarus for passenger and freight traffic on September 12.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Polish Foreign Minister Rados\u0142aw Sikorski\u00a0linked any potential reopening of the border to an end of the migration crisis, which has persisted since 2021 and is allegedly facilitated by Belarus\u2019 security services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since January, the total number of recorded irregular crossings has increased by 20.2 percent year on year. Attempts to cross into Poland dropped slightly to 25,436, while Latvia and Lithuania posted numbers twice as high as last year, with 4,264 and 590 attempts, respectively.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The share of irregular crossings into Poland has dropped from 82.6 percent in eight and a half months of 2024 to 69.4 percent in the same period this year, while Latvia and Lithuania posted increases to 27.3 and 3.4 percent, respectively.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the first 16 days of September 2025, irregular migration flows rose by 23.8 percent compared to the same period last year, with a four-fold spike posted by Latvia and a 9.4-percent decrease via Poland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The flow of people desperate to cross into the EU 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

In June 2021, the Belarusian government suspended a readmission agreement with the EU in response to sanctions that followed the forced landing of a Ryanair flight in Minsk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Latvia, Lithuania and Poland call the migration crisis a \u201chybrid attack\u201d orchestrated by Minsk and Moscow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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