Migration expert Gerald Knaus sees the EU at a historic milestone. The founder of the European Stability Initiative (ESI) is convinced that European politics must not allow the migrants who remain in the forest between Poland and Belarus to be left to their fate or even drawn into a violent conflict. Knaus told the Berliner Zeitung: “People are waiting at the Polish border under unreasonable conditions. It is freezing cold, there is no food or medical care. The people – many with their children – are sitting in the forest and have been prevented by the Belarusian police from going back towards Minsk for many weeks. Poland practices illegal push-backs, which means sending people directly back into immediate physical danger. If the EU sticks to this policy, we are facing a new era for human rights in Europe: The Geneva Refugee Convention would then in fact be history. “
With such behavior, the EU would also lose all credibility to criticize violations of the Refugee Convention in other parts of the world. Knaus: “The EU must succeed in finding a humane and consistent approach at the same time.” Knaus says that the Belarusian President Lukashenko deliberately brought the migrants into the country in response to the EU sanctions in order to use them as a means of pressure against Europe to use. Lukashenko officially announced this in a speech in Brest. The migrants were lured to Belarus in the “false hope that there would be a risk-free trip to Germany from here”. Lukashenko insisted that the EU would not have an answer to this tactic and would have to negotiate with him in the end. In fact, like the EU, migrants fell into a “diabolical trap”.
Tightening of sanctions
In terms of numbers, the group of migrants is actually not a problem for Germany. Knaus: “I am sure that we in Germany would have a majority in politics and the population and would take in a few thousand refugees in need this number remained. But today a federal government that would demand something like this would be faced with resistance in many other EU countries, including Poland. If more people then continued to come, the accusation would be, as it was with many in 2015: Germany has gotten us into this problem. ”The way out would have to be a differentiated approach, which the EU found difficult due to internal differences of opinion and different political approaches.
Three things are essential, according to Knaus, in order not to be dependent on Lukashenko: “The economic sanctions against Belarus and especially against members of the Lukashenko regime must be tightened. A clear message should be sent to Poland that there is no backing for the illegal push-backs. And finally we have to negotiate with a safe, democratic third country in Eastern Europe that declares its willingness to accept refugees after a certain deadline. ”The approximately 4,000 migrants who are currently in the forests on the Polish border could therefore be taken over by Germany . At the same time, efforts should be made to ensure that after a deadline a small number of people who make it to Belarus despite the reduction in flights have their proceedings in a country like Ukraine or Moldova.
That would reduce the number that would go to Belarus immediately. Knaus: “Otherwise the EU would run the risk that the message to the world would be that anyone can come to Germany via Belarus.” received in other areas. In Turkey, it was six billion euros for five years for refugees in the country.
Russian support
According to Knaus, sanctions against Belarus alone would not be enough because Russia could close the gap. Knaus: “The sanctions will not hit the government in Minsk as long as the failures are compensated with Russian support.”
Knaus is convinced that the situation on the border between Belarus and Poland is critical: “The Poles want to prevent people from crossing the border at all costs, Belarus manipulates these people and the regime has no scruples. There is still a risk of escalation. It would be terrible if innocent people got caught between the fronts. ”But negotiations and concessions to Lukashenko would also be too high a price. It is still very difficult to get an overview of the situation. Gerald Knaus: “There is a border strip where nobody from the Polish side is allowed to get in – neither journalists nor activists. The pictures from the Belarusian side are propaganda. So we basically don’t know what is happening to the refugees. This situation is untenable, especially with regard to the principle of the rule of law in the EU. “