MINSK, 23 August (BelTA) – Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko raised the problem of migrants and refugees from Afghanistan and spoke about the incident with Afghans on the border with Poland at the extraordinary session of the Collective Security Council of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) on the situation in Afghanistan on 23 August, BelTA informs.
“The problem of refugees and migrants. There are different estimates of the possible number of refugees and migrants in the first wave. It is absolutely clear that people from Afghanistan will join the waves of migrants from destroyed Syria, Iraq, Libya. Even if their final destination is in the west, they will travel through our countries,” the Belarusian leader said.
Aleksandr Lukashenko reacted to the addresses of the leaders of the other CSTO countries and, first of all, of the Russian president, who spoke about the importance of solidarity and said that the problems arising from the situation in Afghanistan could affect everybody.
“It has already affected us. We are far from those events, but we were the first side to feel the consequences. Probably, you have been informed (your security services have been definitely informed by us), Merkel promised you, the west promised that they will welcome everybody, that they will welcome all refugees from Afghanistan,” the Belarusian leader remarked.
In this context, Aleksandr Lukashenko spoke about the events of the past 2-3 days on the border with Poland. “You were right, several dozens or maybe hundreds (we cannot count them all) of Afghans – not Iraqis, not Syrians, but Afghans – (whom they promised to welcome in the west) moved to the west through Belarus. What did the Poles do? They caught (I cannot put it differently) about 50 people on the territory of Poland. Those people said they were travelling to Germany following the invitation of Mutter Merkel. Threatening them with weapons, shooting in the air, the Poles forces them to move to the border with Belarus. Of course, they were going to Germany, and they do not want to go to Belarus. This is how Poland caused a border conflict on the border, violating the state border of Belarus,” the president said.
“Those poor people crossed the border of Belarus and have been staying there for two or three days. Without water, without food, without shelter. It is not easy to stay there – the weather is 7-8 degrees above zero at night. Poor people. Now I need to think what to do with them,” the Belarusian head of state said.
“You have heard and seen many facts. At least, the whole world has seen that, but the west is quiet about how they force sick, pregnant, half-dead people to go back to the border with Belarus. These are their promises and politics. Therefore, as you have already said here, we cannot trust them. First of all, I mean the west. They have lost this war, they must acknowledge that, and they fled from the country like cowards. These are their problems. What do we have to do with it? Therefore, indeed, they are now laying this burden on our shoulders,” the Belarusian leader concluded.
