HS in Poland | Poland acts differently from Finland and pushes immigrants back – Rajakylä has had to bury several migrants

Bohoniki/Białystok

Right The cemetery of Bohonik, a village on the eastern border of Poland, has a new area, slightly separated from other graves.

The last of the graves in the area was dug less than a month ago. The deceased man’s first name is Mohammad. He was 33 years old when he died.

Mohammad died while crossing the eastern border of Poland, i.e. on the route from Belarus to Poland.

Unlike on the border between Finland and Russia, where migrants have so far come through official border crossings, they come to Poland via illegal overland routes.

Especially in winter, the route can be life-threatening. According to a foundation called Fundacja Ocalenie, 55 people have died on Poland’s eastern border in two years.

Poland’s eastern border is an example of how dark the situation can become when the eastern neighbor starts pushing people across the border. In Poland, the closing of the crossing points or the border fence have not prevented all arrivals.

Boho too the leader of the Tatar community Maciej Szczęsnowicz still remembers the funeral of the first dead migrant from 2021. The family of the Syrian victim participated in the event remotely.

“At that time it felt like a family member had died,” says Szczęsnowicz.

The burial of dead migrants has been partly given to the Tatar community on the eastern border, because the vast majority of immigrants come from Muslim countries.

Bohonik has a mosque built of wood and the know-how to bury victims according to Muslim tradition.

“We want to show that the Polish Muslim community is not indifferent to the suffering at the border,” says Szczęsnowicz of the Tatar community.

Poland operates at its border in a different way than Finland.

Poland pushes a large part of the newcomers back to Belarus, even in the middle of the forest. The human rights organization Human Rights Watch is criticized Poland about violence and forced returns at the border.

Migrants on Poland’s eastern border do not use official crossing points, but enter illegal overland routes with the assistance of the Belarusian authorities.

Migrants avoid the authorities not only because of the fear of returns, but also because the arrivals usually want to file an asylum application in Germany, Poland’s western neighbor.

“Usually we catch them when they are already in the car on their way to Germany,” a press representative of the regional border guard Katarzyna Zdanowicz says HS in the city of Białystok.

Car rides are organized by smugglers.

According to the border authority, all arrivals who do not need immediate hospital treatment or do not want to apply for asylum in Poland will be directed to the border fence and back to Belarus. The same rule applies to families, even if they have children with them.

Reports

according to the report, forced returns have also affected migrants who would have liked to apply for asylum in Poland. The return of those seeking asylum is established in the European Court of Human Rights as a violation of human rights treaties.

Zdanowicz of the Border Guard says that returns are not done by force. It is difficult to prove the claim, as the media is not allowed to follow returns to Belarus.

Returns are made in the field without contacting the authorities of the border neighbor Belarus.

“To the forest, but to a safe place where there are no rivers or mud and which are close to the crossing points in Belarus,” says Zdanowicz of the border guard.

According to Zdanowicz, Belarusian troops are on duty somewhere nearby, as they initially directed the migrants to try to reach Poland.

There is only one official crossing point open on the border between Poland and Belarus. According to Zdanowicz, the connections between the countries’ authorities have practically broken down.

Migrants may be given food and a dry layer of clothing if they get wet on the route. After that, they are directed to the service gate located in the border fence and pushed to the side of Belarus.

Near in a small town in the border region, the garage is packed full of winter clothing packages and first aid supplies. The clothing package includes a winter jacket, top pants and a long underlayer.

The clothes of the arrivals are often wet, and they need dry clothes before continuing the journey towards Germany. First aid is needed, for example, when the barbed wire of the fence has cut.

Anna Sikora is a local volunteer who helps migrants who are hiding from the authorities. Sikora goes to take clothes and food, when the migrant who crossed the border sends his location on his cell phone.

Lately there have been fewer visitors. It is also in Poland noticedthat emigrants are more interested in the route through Finland than before.

Sikora knows very well that this is not the same kind of immigration as, for example, at the sea borders of Southern Europe. The eastern neighbor guides newcomers to the border.

“We know that Putin and Belarus use them,” says Sikora.

“But we still have to treat them like people, not animals.”

Helping does not always mean that you support immigration. Szczęsnowicz of the Tatar community says directly that he does not want immigrants to Poland.

According to him, the number of arrivals will never end if they start being accepted. However, that does not mean that those in need are left alone.

“I made the decision to help. I help migrants, but also border guards.”

Szczęsnowicz’s policy is to offer hot soup to everyone at the border.