Poland postpones reopening of two checkpoints

October 30, Pozirk. Poland has postponed the opening of two border crossings with Belarus by several weeks, Interior Minister Marcin Kierwiński has announced.

“We would have done this much sooner if Lithuania had not closed its own crossings with Belarus. The Lithuanians are our partners and we are in contact,” Kierwiński told Polskie Radio.

The border issue was raised at yesterday’s meeting with the Baltic interior ministers in Gdańsk. Officials also discussed it with Vilnius today by phone.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk had announced plans to open two additional border crossings on October 28 as he addressed a European Union event at the borders in Białystok, eastern Poland.

The move came as a surprise weeks after Poland shut its border completely accusing Belarus of being a source of hybrid threats.

The re-opening of the two border crossings, most likely Bobrowniki and Kuźnica, is scheduled for early November and would be a “trial” run, interia.pl reported, quoting Tusk as saying.  “If it turns out for any reason that the border needs to be closed, I will not hesitate for a moment,” he added, linking such a reaction to potential security concerns.

“If we say that these checkpoints can be opened, it is because the border now is guarded better than ever before,” he said. “We can take a certain risk linked to its opening.”

Currently, Poland operates only the Terespol-Brest checkpoint for passenger traffic and the Kukuryki-Kazłovičy for cargoes.

The Bobrowniki crossing has remained closed since February 2023. Warsaw made its reopening conditional on the release of Polish minority activist Andrzej Poczobut, sentenced in Belarus to eight years in prison in a case widely regarded as politically motivated. Kuźnica was closed in 2021 over the irregular migration crisis, which Warsaw regards as a hybrid attack by Minsk.

Poland to reopen two Belarus border crossings next month, PM says