Due to the migrant crisis, all three countries have declared a state of emergency on the border with Belarus.
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“We are in close contact and dialogue with the three countries,” EU Home Affairs Commissioner Ilva Johann said to members of the European Parliament’s (EP) Civil Liberties Committee on Tuesday.
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She pointed out that the evaluation of the laws was still ongoing, but that it was likely that Member States would be required to amend them.
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The Commissioner did not reveal when and at what points the law would be required to change.
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Mr Johansson’s remarks reflect Brussels’ general opposition to the exclusion of illegal immigrants from the bloc’s external borders. Johanson has said in the past that the exclusion of illegal immigrants should not be the norm.
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“There is a feeling that the EC lives on another planet and represents either this planet or the interests of Belarus and Russia,” commented Latvian Defense Minister Artis Pabriks (AP).
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Pabriks told LETA that Johanson’s statement had followed a meeting with the relevant EP committee, where “the mood is often left-handed than usual”, and that such a statement does not necessarily mean that it will be an EC decision.
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If such statements come from the relevant Commissioner, then the EC still does not really understand what is happening at the EU’s external borders and there is no understanding of geopolitics in general, Pabriks believes.
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“If the EC goes so far as to call for a change in migration policy and the reception of migrants, there is only one answer, as long as this type of hybrid operation continues, so that no EC expects any of these countries to change its policy.” said the minister and expressed doubts as to whether such a proposal would gain the support of EU leaders at all.
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Pabriks also called on EC commissioners to reconsider their statements, as they “only pour water into the mills of Belarus and the Kremlin”.
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“This is exactly what the organizers of this hybrid operation would like to hear. Commissioners need to realize that this is a bear service to the EU itself, thus degrading its essence, undermining European citizens’ trust in the EU institutions and actually harming the EU’s long-term global and geopolitical interests.” Minister.
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In the past months, efforts have been made in Latvia, Lithuania and Poland to send thousands of illegal immigrants from Belarus, most of them arriving in Belarus as tourists from Iraq, as part of an extensive hybrid attack on Belarus’s dictator Lukashenko.
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The EU has accused the Minsk regime of seeking to avenge support for the Belarusian opposition and of sanctions against Belarus in response to last year’s violent crackdown on protests.
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Poland passed a law in October legalizing the exclusion of migrants. Lithuania amended its law on aliens in the summer, allowing for collective expulsions in some cases.
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On Tuesday, the Lithuanian parliament declared an intensified state of emergency in the municipalities along the Belarusian border, taking into account the risks associated with the large-scale concentration of migrants in Belarus on the Polish border. The declaration of a heightened emergency allows border guards to use proportionate physical force to prevent people from entering Belarus from Belarus.
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Latvia uses similar tactics in areas where an emergency situation has been declared.
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Under EU law, Member States are required to provide reception for the examination of individual asylum applications.
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The EC is apparently trying to balance seemingly incompatible things by, on the one hand, calling on the Member States under attack to comply with EU law and, on the other, accusing the Lukashenko regime of turning migrants into weapons.
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Johanson also called for greater transparency on Poland’s border with Belarus.
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Poland has banned journalists and activists trying to support illegal immigrants from entering the border area and has already sent some 15,000 troops there.
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Mr Johansson also pointed out that Poland, unlike Lithuania, had not allowed EU agencies such as Frontex or Easo into the border.
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