Russia sends bombers to overfly Belarus as Poland border crisis escalates

Russia has dispatched strategic bomber planes to fly over Belarus, accusing the European Union (EU) of trying to “strangle” its close ally by shutting Poland’s border to hundreds of desperate migrants trying to cross into the trade union.

According to the Russian Defense Ministry, the Tu-22M3 bombers helped test Belarus’ joint air defense system on Wednesday, RIA news agency reported.

Russia sent the bombers in a signal of further support for Belarus, which is engaged in a border crisis with Poland. Hundreds of migrants are stranded along the razor-wire fence separating Belarus and Poland.

Poland closes border crossing point with Belarus

Poland is closing its border crossing with Belarus at Kuznica, the Border Guard said on Monday.

Poland has reportedly planned to send Leopard tanks to the town of Biala Podlaska on the border.

Putin blames EU for ‘catastrophe’

Meanwhile on Wednesday, Russia blamed the EU for the crisis, accusing it of trying to “strangle” Belarus with plans to close part of the frontier. President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in a statement that the Russian president had told German Chancellor Angela Merkel in a phone call that the EU should discuss the crisis directly with Minsk. “It is apparent that a humanitarian catastrophe is looming against the background of Europeans' reluctance to demonstrate commitment to their European values,” Peskov said.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov also told a joint news conference with his Belarusian counterpart, Vladimir Makei, that he hoped responsible Europeans would “not allow themselves to be drawn into a spiral that is fairly dangerous.”

“This is nothing other than further attempts to actually strangle Belarus,” he said, adding that the EU had in the past let in similar groups of migrants into the continent.

The West accuses Belarus of coordinating an unprecedented wave of asylum-seekers in retaliation for existing sanctions imposed by the EU on Belarus’ President Alexander Lukashenko, who has denied the allegation. He has warned Poland against sending armored vehicles and troops to the border area, saying, “In today's world, taking up arms is tantamount to death or suicide.”

Poland blackmailing Belarus with military deployment to border: Lukashenko

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko accuses Poland of blackmailing his country by sending armored vehicles and troops to the border amid an escalation of a migration crisis.

Lukashenko has said Minsk would not hesitate to invite Russian troops to the country in the event of an extraordinary foreign threat.

The Belarusian foreign minister has also reassured that Russia and Belarus were mutually supporting each other “including in terms of a joint response to unfriendly activity against our countries.”

Poland’s Foreign Minister Mateusz Morawiecki accuses Moscow and Minsk of using migrants as “human shields to destabilize the situation in Poland and the EU.”

“This attack, which Lukashenko is conducting, has its mastermind in Moscow, the mastermind is President Putin.”

Putin’s spokesman immediately responded to the Wednesday remarks, describing them as “absolutely irresponsible and unacceptable.”

The Polish police said they had detained more than 50 migrants who crossed the border over the past 24 hours. A total of 12,000-14,000 migrants may be staying in Belarus, according to Warsaw.

Belarus shares a border with Ukraine in the south. It also borders Poland and Lithuania in the west, Latvia in the north, and Russia in the east.

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