Polish President Andrzej Duda has issued a stern warning about potentially blocking a vital railway route used for exporting Chinese goods to the European Union as part of a strategy to address the migration crisis on its eastern frontier, according to Bloomberg.
During a state visit to Beijing in late June, Duda linked the issues of migration and cargo transport across the Belarus border. Since then, there has been a significant reduction in illegal border crossings from Belarus into Poland.
Bloomberg notes that over the past three years, Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko has been intensifying the migration crisis at the Polish border. The situation escalated in May when a Polish soldier was killed by a migrant, prompting the government to announce the allocation of approximately $2.5 billion to fortify the border.
With Russia’s invasion of Ukraine severing traditional trade routes through that country, Belarus has become the only route for Chinese goods to reach the EU by rail, with traffic increasing by 89 percent in the first quarter of 2024. Lukashenko has reportedly been pleased with the increase in Chinese transit, attempting to offset Minsk’s near-total reliance on Moscow for access to cheap energy resources and loans.
Poland’s Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski remarked that raising the issue of cargo transit in discussions with China “could have been a factor” contributing to the decrease in illegal border crossings. He emphasized the ongoing outrage in Poland over the killing of their soldier at the border.
The situation at the Poland-Belarus border began to deteriorate rapidly ahead of the European Parliament elections in June. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk stated that Belarus and Russia had turned migration into a weapon. He noted that the majority of foreigners attempting to illegally enter the country are from Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan, Syria, and Iran.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry conveyed to Bloomberg that Beijing hopes the parties will be able to “properly resolve differences through dialogue and ensure the safety and continuity of international logistics channels.”
Tomasz Siemoniak, Poland’s interior minister, stated that the number of attempts to illegally cross the border had dropped by 70 percent since the introduction of a buffer zone in June.
