The sinister, Kremlin-aligned regime of Belarus' dictator Alexander Lukashenko was slapped with sanctions by the European Union (EU) after Lukashenko's bogus "election" returned him to a sixth term, leading to mass arrests of pro-democracy demonstrators. In retaliation for the sanctions, Lukashenko has been conducting a campaign of encouraging immigrants from the Middle East primarily to come to Belarus as a transit point to enter the EU nations of Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. Belarus' intent is to destabilize these neighbors with a massive influx of refugees until they lift their sanctions.
The actions of Belarus have put the EU in a human rights quandry, with Lithuania extending its border fencing and Poland considering a wall on the border, as migrant numbers grow on the Belarus side. But the potential for destabilization may end up overcoming those concerns:
“'We are facing a brutal, hybrid attack on our EU borders. Belarus is weaponizing migrants’ distress in a cynical and shocking way,' European Council President Charles Michel said at an event in Germany on Tuesday, the 32nd anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.
'We have opened the debate on the EU financing of physical border infrastructure. This must be settled rapidly because Polish and Baltic borders are EU borders. One for all and all for one,' Michel said.
Frequent flights to Minsk, Belarus, from Iraq and Syria carrying immigrants are booked by a state-owned travel agency, with passengers paying huge fees, much of which ends up in Lukashenko's bank account. Aside from the dictator's cynical greed and inhumanity, he's doing his patrons in the Kremlin a favor by causing divisions in the EU over immigration policy.
In an escalation of the tensions, today Lukashenko delivered an ominous threat to disrupt the pipeline carrying natural gas that passes through his country to the West:
"'We are heating Europe, they are still threatening us that they will close the border. And if we shut off natural gas there?,' Lukashenko said in comments published by the state news agency Belta.
'Therefore, I would recommend that the Polish leadership, Lithuanians and other headless people think before speaking,' he was cited as saying."
This authoritarian thug is a menace, and the EU needs to unify in their opposition to him (and his Kremlin ally). Whether that can be accomplished remains to be seen.
(photo: Immigrants at Belarus-Polish border. Leonid Shcheglov, AFP/Getty)
