Russian diplomat slams threats of anti-Belarusian sanctions over migrants as absurd
The West is threatening Belarus with sanctions for the European Union’s own reluctance to accept migrants, Russian Permanent Representative to the United Nations Vassily Nebenzia said on Tuesday.
“When similar situations happened at the borders of other European Union countries, or when refugees arrived in the European Union from other countries, you were saying different things. And now you are threatening to impose sanctions? Who on? What for? For your being reluctant to receive refugees who want to reach the European Union?” he said at a meeting of the UN Security Council. “Stop shifting responsibility on others.”
“Our Estonian colleague (foreign minister – TASS) could not invent anything better than to use the UN Security Council rostrum to vilify Belarus again. Let me recall that the refugees who are staying at Belarus’ borders with Poland and Lithuania want to reach Europe, they don’t want to stay in Belarus,” he said. “So, who is creating the crisis by building barbed wire fences and pulling troops to the border?”
“You often speak about full respect for the principles of international humanitarian law, but when it comes to observing them, you shift responsibility onto others,” Nebenzia noted. “I want to ask a question. Is it Minsk’s bankrupt policy in the Middle East that has prompted migrant flows from Syria at the border with Poland and Lithuania?”
The situation at the Polish-Belarusian border deteriorated dramatically on Monday, when several thousand migrants approached the Polish border. Some of them tried to tear down the barbed wire fence and break through into Poland. Polish law enforcers used tear gas to stop the migrants.
EU countries accuse Minsk of deliberate escalation of the crisis and call for more sanctions against Belarus. Meanwhile, Lukashenko said that the blame for this situation rests on Western countries because people are fleeing their countries gripped by hostilities provoked by their actions.
Source: TASS