OUR Poland announced today additional traffic restrictions from Belarushours after Warsaw reported that Minsk had announced the expulsion of three Poles diplomas.

Citing “state security concerns”, Warsaw announced on February 9 that it was closing the border crossing with Belarus at Bobrovniki, leading to a sharp decline in already hostile relations between the two countries.

The transportation of goods by Belarusian cars through the border crossing Kukuriki-Kozlowice will be suspended from 19:00 tomorrow Tuesday, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Poland announced today.

This decision is connected with the decision of Minsk to restrict the movement of Polish trucks on the borders of Belarus with Latvia and Lithuania, the ministry said.

Earlier today, two Polish consuls in Grodno and a Polish border guard mediator in Minsk were ordered to leave Belarus “by the end of Wednesday afternoon,” Polish Foreign Ministry spokesman Lukasz Yasina said.

“We are thinking about the correct and adequate response to this,” he said.

Poland is a paradise for opponents of Lukashenka

Belarus called Warsaw’s decision to close the border crossing in Bobrovniki irrational and dangerous. It was not possible to contact the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Belarus for comments on the latest developments.

Poland is an important haven for opponents of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, and Warsaw has been one of Kyiv’s staunchest supporters since Belarus’ main ally Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

Relations between Warsaw and Minsk deteriorated further on February 8, when a Belarusian court sentenced a Polish-born journalist to eight years in prison in a trial that Warsaw said was politically motivated.

Kilometer lines

Meanwhile, the closure of the Bobrovniki border crossing and Minsk’s response to this move created significant problems, and today the line of trucks from the Polish side at the only open checkpoint for goods on the border between Poland and Belarus was more than 40 kilometers. to the customs authorities.

“About 1,900 trucks form this queue, which reaches about 63 hours of waiting” on the sides of the road leading to the Koroschin Pass, local customs spokesman Michal Druss told AFP.

In addition, the Polish police arrested seven customs officers at the Bobrovniki crossing suspected of being involved in cigarette smuggling.

^{Source: APE, AFP, Reuters.}