MINSK, 12 November (BelTA) – Poland and the Baltic states are using the migrant crisis to their own advantage, Belarus' Permanent Representative to the UN Valentin Rybakov told RIA Novosti, BelTA has learned.
“Poland and Lithuania are taking advantage of the situation around migrants in their own interests - as an excuse to pump extra money from the European Union and to justify their anti-immigrant policy and numerous violations of their international commitments,” Valentin Rybakov emphasized.
The diplomat added that by demonizing Belarus, the neighboring countries are trying to increase their importance in the eyes of Western politicians.
Earlier, members of the UN Security Council Estonia, France, Ireland, Norway, Great Britain, the United States, as well as an incoming member of the council, Albaniaaccused Minsk of orchestrating the border crisis in a bid to destabilize the situation in the region.
“We believe that it was the West that ‘instrumentalized' this very migration, because they destroyed the statehood, economy, infrastructure in a number of countries, their way of life. It is the Western countries that should bear full responsibility for people who are now fleeing en masse from their homelands that were destroyed by Western countries,” Valentin Rybakov noted.
According to him, Belarus is neither the cause nor the source of the migrant flows heading to the European Union. “People do not go to Belarus. People go through Belarus,” the diplomat explained.
