Belarus’ authorities to ask migrants to return home – Lukashenko

<p> MINSK, Nov 30 - PrimePress. Belarus’ authorities will ask the migrants staying the country to return home. President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko made a statement to this effect on 30 Nov 2021 in an interview with Dmitry Kiselyov, General Director at the Russian state news agency MIA Russia Today. </p> <p>   </p> <p> Lukashenko says that when he spoke on the phone with Germany’s acting Chancellor Angela Merkel, she asked him to deal with the repatriation of refugees. “So I said: ‘You know, Angela, let’s not even use such harsh words.’ They mean we must do it by force. I told her right away and repeated at the end of our conversation that I would try to solve this problem before the New Year. We do not need it, either. There are lots of migrants in Minsk, Grodno and other places. Our people are not happy about it, either. We will ask these people, who have entered Belarus legally, on tourist visas, to return home, because there will be no humanitarian corridor. I had already returned more than a thousand of them to Iraq and I offered her to take in those [2,000 illegal migrants stranded in the camp at the Bruzgi logistics centre on the border with Poland – editor’s note].” </p> <p>   </p> <p> Lukashenko claims that the EU was the first to withdraw fr om the readmission agreement with Belarus. "When the EU terminated the readmission agreement, I said back then: well, since they decided to break this agreement, to stop cooperating with us on border protection issues, it was their problem. But I would not defend them anymore the way I did last year. When I talked to [Russian President Vladimir] Putin about the origins, I told him that this is wh ere it all started,” said Lukashenko. </p> <p>   </p> <p> In his words, the evacuation flights were financed by Iraq. As of last week, Belarus had already spent $12.5 million on migrants. “Today this amount must be twice as much. The WHO people – the World Health Organization - have sent in some kind of help: stockings, hygiene kits, diapers, stuff like this,” said Lukashenko. </p> <p>   </p> <p> In July 2021, President Lukashenko stated that, due to sanctions imposed by Western countries, he no longer intended to restrain illegal migration to the European Union. This was followed by attempts to illegally cross the border with Lithuania, Poland and Latvia by migrants from the Middle East, with total inactivity of the Belarusian border service. By 1 November, the Polish border guards alone registered 23 thousand such attempts. On 15 November at a session of the EU Foreign Affairs Council (FAC), foreign ministers of member states of the European Union (EU) reached a political agreement on applying the 5th parcel of sanctions against Belarus. </p> <p>   </p> <p> Merkel discussed the migration issue on 10 and 11 November by phone with Putin, who said, among other things, that de-escalation of the migration crisis is only possible through direct talks between the EU and the Belarusian authorities. On 15 November, Merkel and Lukashenko held their first telephone conversation, the second phone talk followed on 17 November. </p> <p> The EU has sent €700,000 in humanitarian aid to migrants in Belarus. </p> <p> The European Union intended to mobilise up to €3.5 million to support voluntary returns of migrants from Belarus. End </p>

2021-12-01

Primepress