The exclusion zone on Poland’s border with Belarus will be lifted on July 1. Since work on a high fence along the border is well advanced, there is no longer any need for the restrictions, the Ministry of the Interior in Warsaw said on Thursday. However, in the future you may only approach the fence up to 200 meters.
In late summer and autumn last year, the situation on the Polish-Belarusian border escalated: thousands of people tried to enter the EU illegally. The European Union accused the Belarusian ruler Alexander Lukashenko of bringing migrants from crisis regions to the EU’s external border in an organized manner in order to put pressure on the West.
Poland initially declared a state of emergency in a three-kilometer-wide strip along the border, later the area was declared a restricted zone. A total of 183 localities are affected. So far, non-residents and helpers have not been allowed in, journalists only in guided tours of the border guards.
