Britain rushes to help EU as troops deploy to Belarus border to ‘support Poland’.
Officials in Warsaw warned that hundreds of migrants have continued to flock to the EU’s external border after recent footage showed that Poland’s border force had been preventing those trying to cross from Belarus.
Between 3,000 and 4,000 people are believed to have settled in a makeshift immigrant camp in front of the small Polish town of Kuźnica.
Now, the Defense Ministry has confirmed that a small team of military personnel will explore how to provide “engineering support” to Poland along the border with Belarus.
This week, EU Council President Charles Michel arrived in Warsaw to meet with Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki to discuss the situation.
According to Politico, the visit was aimed at showing the EU’s “solidarity” with Poland, despite growing tensions between Warsaw and the bloc.
The meeting also “highlighted the different opinions within the bloc when it comes to how Brussels can respond to Minsk’s deplorable tactics.”
All 27 EU member states agreed to suspend a visa facilitation agreement between Belarus and the bloc on Tuesday.
A spokesperson for the European Commission said: “This is part of the inhumane and really gangster-style approach of the Lukashenko regime that it is lying to people, abusing people, deceiving them and taking them to Belarus under the false promise of having a easy entry into the EU “.
Brussels is also said to be in talks with 13 countries, including Iraq and Pakistan, which could be the sources of the people arriving at the EU’s external border.
“We currently have a migrant camp that is blocked from the Belarusian side.
“They are aggressive actions that we must repel, fulfilling our obligations as members of the European Union.”
A spokesman for Warsaw added: “We hope that there will be an escalation of this type of action on the Polish border in the near future, which will be of an armed nature.”
Belarus has challenged the claims made by the EU.
A statement from the Belarusian border guard read: “The indifference and inhumane attitude of the Polish authorities has led the refugees to take such a desperate step.”
Russia has also expressed support for President Lukashenko’s regime.
Kremlin Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, 71, even suggested that the EU hand over financial support to Minsk in a bid to stop the number of people arriving at the border.
According to the Belarusian state news agency Belta, President Lukashenko held talks with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to discuss the problems of the EU’s external border.