How Belarus Manufactured a Border Crisis - The New York Times

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For three decades, President Aleksandr Lukashenko of Belarus, a former Soviet nation in Eastern Europe, ruled with an iron fist. But pressure has mounted on him in the past year and a half.

In 2020, Mr. Lukashenko declared victory in a highly disputed election and violently put down the resulting protests. In response, the European Union enacted sanctions and refused to recognize him as a legitimate president.

More sanctions came when, this year, he forced a European commercial jet to land in Belarus in order to arrest a dissident.

So, in the hopes of bringing the European Union to the negotiating table, Mr. Lukashenko has engineered a migrant crisis on the Poland-Belarus border.

What are the conditions like for those at the border, and will Mr. Lukashenko’s political gamble reap his desired results?

On today’s episode

Monika Pronczuk, a reporter covering the European Union for The New York Times.
Anton Troianovski, the Moscow bureau chief for The New York Times.

Migrants in Belarus near the border with Poland. — James Hill for The New York Times

Background reading

Poland massed thousands of troops on its border with Belarus to keep out Middle Eastern migrants who have set up camp there, as Western officials accuse Belarus’s leader of intentionally trying to create a new migrant crisis in Europe.
Belarusian authorities on Thursday cleared the encampments at the main border crossing into Poland, removing for the moment a major flashpoint that has raised tensions across the continent.

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Monika Pronczuk and contributed reporting.

The Daily is made by Lisa Tobin, Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Larissa Anderson, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Austin Mitchell, Neena Pathak, Dan Powell, Dave Shaw, Sydney Harper, Daniel Guillemette, Robert Jimison, Mike Benoist, Liz O. Baylen, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Kaitlin Roberts, Rachelle Bonja, Diana Nguyen, Marion Lozano, Corey Schreppel, Anita Badejo, Rob Szypko, Elisheba Ittoop, Chelsea Daniel, Mooj Zadie and Rowan Niemisto.

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