(AP) Polish officials on Thursday reported a change in migration patterns across the country’s border with Belarus, with Africans who first traveled to Russia making up most of those seeking to enter Poland illegally by that route instead of people from the Mideast.
The government said the African migrants include individuals passing through Russia, a close ally and another neighbor of Belarus, as well as people who were in Russia for a longer period.
In an emailed statement to the Associated Press, the Polish government described the migration as part of a “hybrid operation aimed at destabilizing the NATO eastern flank.”
Migrants and asylum-seekers have tried to cross from Belarus into Poland and Lithuania, and to a lesser extent Latvia, since last summer. The three nations are in the east of both European Union and NATO territory.
