Mercenaries from the Wagner Group might have already tried to cross the border with Latvia, the head of the Latvian State Border Guard, Guntis Pujatas, told the Latvian portal Delfi.
Border guards have recorded several dozen cases of border infrastructure damage since the beginning of the year.
The head of the Latvian Border Guard pointed out that recently, many migrants from African countries started arriving at the Belarusian-Latvian border. He believes this is a significant change.
Earlier, migrants mainly from Iraq tried to cross the border. Meanwhile, the Wagner mercenaries recruit people, among others, in Africa. In Guntis Pujatas’ opinion, it cannot be ruled out that among these migrants, there might be individuals recruited by the mercenaries.
The head of the Latvian Border Guard also mentioned the idea of completely closing the border with Belarus. In his opinion, although it would make his team’s job easier, it’s rather impossible since many Latvian citizens have families in Belarus, and contact with them would be difficult.
Latvia, Poland, and Lithuania have all been dealing with individuals trying to illegally enter their territory for over two years. Over 5,000 such cases have been thwarted just this year.
Last week, the Latvian Border Guard noticed that several migrants were aided in crossing the border by Belarusian officers. They first damaged the fencing at the border and then repaired it so that these people couldn’t return to Belarus.
