The migration crisis on Latvia's green border is effectively over with Russia's re-invasion of Ukraine, and there is now no doubt that last summer's hybrid attack by migrants from Belarus was a preparatory stage for the real war. For Russia's genocide against the Ukrainian people to also be carried out while they are on the run. But the Kremlin's plan failed.
European civilized society knows how to distinguish between genuine war refugees and conscripted adventurers, criminals and, with rare exceptions, their victims. The fake victims have been pushed back, while the real victims of war are welcomed and cared for in Europe. There is a fundamental difference between a mob of aggressive Iraqi men trying to force their way into a foreign country, knowing full well that they are committing a criminal offence, and Ukrainian mothers with children who have gone abroad while their husbands are fighting for their homeland.
The former had nothing to run away from, except their own responsibilities, because the war in Iraq is long over. They arrived in Belarus on tourist visas. Planes flew back and forth from Iraqi airports to Minsk, promising all comers a one-way road to the European Union and a better life, built not by hard work in their own country, but for €1,500-2,000 in the rich West. The Belarusian armed forces and border guards helped the migrants move closer to the border - Poland, Lithuania, Latvia - and waved - best of luck in your travels. And they walked. In larger and smaller military-style units, also led by experienced war veterans, sometimes using sick people and children they brought with them as a passport to Europe. To be admitted to Europe for humanitarian reasons. Accompanying minors are considered "family", not human traffickers. They were and still are accepted, but in relatively small numbers, because the children on that side have long since run out. And hybrid operation itself has also dried up. By mid-January, in cooperation with the Iraqi authorities, more than 4,000 migrants had been repatriated, with no new arrivals. Flights from Iraqi airports to Minsk have been cancelled.
According to the State Border Guard, since August 10, when the state of emergency was declared at the border, more than 6,600 people have been prevented from crossing the border illegally, while half a hundred have been allowed to cross the border illegally on humanitarian grounds. It should be clarified that the state of emergency allows the authorities to pursue a policy of exclusion (eviction) without examining asylum claims, and at the same time constitutes an amnesty, since criminal offences committed by migrants are also not investigated. The fate of the Iraqi adventurers is of little interest to anyone at the moment. That includes the instigators of this move. Some groups of migrants still remain on the Belarusian side, but the intensity of attempts to cross the border has dropped significantly. The same groups of migrants try again and again to cross the border unsuccessfully, or they cross, are caught and pushed back again. There have already been several days when no attempt was detected at the Latvian border. At the end of last year, there were between sixty and seventy migrants per day, but in recent weeks an average of five to ten migrants has been recorded. The situation is similar in Poland, where the number of migrants turned away has fallen from several hundred per day to several dozen. On March 24, for example, 70 attempts to cross the Polish border were recorded.
They are mostly the same people, familiar to border guards and soldiers, who are here along the European Union border to keep tensions alive. But why this tension was necessary is clearly answered by Russia's re-invasion of Ukraine. It was not a Belarusian operation. It was not an asymmetrical response to sanctions or to the Mayor of Riga playing with the Belarusian flag. It was a Kremlin operation that was part of the preparatory phase of a war, carried out by Iraqi and Belarussian hands, with the aim of arousing a fundamentally hostile attitude towards migrants in European society. The distrustful attitude of the Eastern Europeans towards the Iraqis who were sent there was also justified. Although, initially, neither the Western countries nor the European Union institutions understood the situation. The migrants sent from Belarus came here, demolishing border structures, committing serious criminal offences, humiliating the few who gave them a helping hand. The most important thing is that these "refugees" had nothing to run away from. It was their own free choice. In the end, most of those who were let in went west to do God knows what. The Kremlin reckoned that, having prepared the ground in this way, European society would also have a negative attitude towards genuine war refugees. Ukrainians fleeing the war will be lumped in with the shameless Iraqis and will be met with army batons and the disgust of the population as they flee. But things were very different.
People understood immediately that Ukrainian mothers, children and elderly people were real war refugees, unlike those fake refugees recruited by Belarus. Ukrainians come here not by hiding in the bushes, but by legal means. And now society is joining hands to make life as easy as possible for Ukrainians abroad. They help with housing, with job opportunities, with money. State institutions, local authorities, but most of all the population. Of course, not all of them. Not everyone can, and not everyone wants to. There are separatists in Latvia, too, who would at the first opportunity hand over the Latvian state to the Russian Federation. Agents of influence who deliberately act in the interests of the Kremlin. Also people who are fooled by Russian propaganda and refuse to believe the obvious. But this is no longer a matter for debate. Russia is an aggressor that has attacked a peaceful country and is seeking to destroy its statehood and enslave its people. Since Russia's re-invasion of Ukraine, according to the most modest estimates, around three million Ukrainians have fled their country. They are mostly women with children. However, 500,000 Ukrainians have returned to Ukraine. They are mostly men of fighting ability.
Ukrainians are defending their country, and other nations must help them by any means possible. Both inside and outside Ukraine.
*****
Be the first to read interesting news from Latvia and the world by joining our Telegram and Signal channels.