{"id":99264,"date":"2024-08-06T13:33:59","date_gmt":"2024-08-06T10:33:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/99264\/"},"modified":"2026-03-09T20:10:49","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T20:10:49","slug":"lithuania-sends-border-guards-to-latvias-border-with-belarus","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/pozirk.online\/en\/news\/99264\/","title":{"rendered":"Lithuania sends border guards to Latvia\u2019s border with Belarus"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

August 6, Pozirk<\/em>.<\/strong> Nine Lithuanian border guards, including K9 and criminal intelligence officers, left for Latvia yesterday to help it guard its border with Belarus, LSM<\/a><\/em> reported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Lithuanian group will stay at the Latvian-Belarusian border for at least two weeks. Earlier reports said that Riga had requested up to 15 additional border guards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the fall of 2023, 20 Lithuanian border guards helped their Latvian counterparts to guard the border and prevent illegal border crossings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last month, illegal border crossings by third-country nationals via Belarus into Latvia grew to 1,043. Illegal border crossings rose 2.4-fold from June and 1.2-fold year on year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The surge may be linked to the Polish border area entry ban introduced in June and the redirection of illegal migrant flows. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the start of 2024, the European Union thwarted at least 25,966 illegal border crossings on its shared border with Belarus, with 21,895 attempts via Poland, 3,698 via Latvia and 373 via Lithuania.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The migration crisis at the Belarus-EU border started in spring 2021 after Alaksandar \u0141uka\u0161enka, angered by EU sanctions, had indicated that Minsk would not prevent migrants from Africa and Asia from using Belarus as a route to the EU.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In June 2021, the Belarusian government announced the suspension of 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

Tensions on the border escalated this spring with the spike in illegal border crossings and attacks on Polish border guards by people trying to cross the border illegally. One of them resulted in the death of Polish soldier Mateusz Sitek, stabbed at the border with Belarus.<\/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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EU stops some 380 illegal entries from Belarus in four days<\/h3>\n
August 5, Pozirk. The European Union (EU) has stopped at least 379 illegal entries from Belarus over the past four days, according to border services. Poland reported 284 cases, Latvia reported 89, and Lithuania six. The EU prevented 67 crossings …<\/div>\n \n