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The EU will tighten sanctions on the Belarussian government over those close to its ruling party, the union’s chief ambassador said, as ministers prepare to respond to what Brussels calls a “mixed attack” on its eastern border.
Thousands of people have traveled from the Middle East via Minsk to the borders of Belarus and Poland, Lithuania and Latvia in recent months with the hope of joining the EU. European officials have said this is happening made and Minsk in return for bloc support to Belarusian protesters.
Josep Borrell, head of the European External Action Service, EU security and ambassador, said foreign ministers meeting on Monday would shed more light on sanctions law in Belarus, as a way to motivate President Alexander. Lukashenko to ban immigrants from the European border.
Lukasjenko “believes that in retaliation in this way he will twist our arm and remove the sanctions,” Borrell told the French newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche. “Very different from what’s going on.”
On Sunday afternoon, Borrell said he had telephoned Belarus’ foreign minister Vladimir Makei to raise “poverty concerns” on the EU border. “What is happening here is unacceptable and should be stopped. “People should not be used as weapons,” he said on Twitter after the call.
Borrell’s comments came after EU ambassadors told the Financial Times on Friday that the bloc was working to create a large list of people and organizations involved in supporting the migration of people from countries such as Syria, Yemen and Iraq to the EU-Belarus border.
The EU is considering sanctions on two Belarusian officials, a Syrian plane and a hotel in Minsk, ambassadors said. The list includes the Syrian carrier Cham Wings for a flight to Belarus and the Minsk Hotel for migrants, and possibly via Minsk airport. The member states were divided over whether the procedures should be used at the airport due to the legal issues involved, ambassadors said. They say the final list of people and organizations will take weeks to complete the EU alliance with allies.
In an interview with JDD on Sunday, Borrell said: “We strengthen [the sanctions] directly related to their affiliates [Lukashenko]. We punish individuals, as well as companies that have export power. We have not exhausted our power to ban companies, but we do not want this to disrupt people’s lives. ”
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Sunday that Warsaw was in talks with Lithuania and Latvia about starting negotiations between Nato countries on the issue. He also raised hopes of closing the EU-Belarus border, and said the EU should link the Polish wall that is planning to build on its eastern border.
“We already know that in order to curb Belarusian rule, words alone are not enough,” he told a news agency in Poland. “Lukashenko will not stop this at the border unless we start doing things together.”
Lukashenko warned Thursday that his country could revenge against any “illegal” sanctions by limiting the export of gas or goods to Europe. Russia supplies about 40 percent of the EU’s gas emissions, and one-fifth of that pass through Belarus.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that Lukashenko had not spoken to him about the threat, and hoped that the Belarussian president would not try to end the gas.
In a series of interviews broadcast on state television on Sunday, Putin also said that Moscow was ready to help resolve the border issue when asked, but criticized it for years of US-Nato intervention in the Middle East.
Brussels has been urging countries used as a migration center in Minsk to help stop the movement of people, which has left thousands at risk of freezing between Belarus and Polish troops on the eastern border of the bloc.
According to data from FlightRadar, Cham Wings has flown four flights from Damascus to Minsk since November 7. The plane said on Saturday that it was stopping Belarus’ “fast-moving” aircraft.
On Friday, Turkey’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation said it had banned citizens of Iraq, Syria and Yemen from buying tickets from Turkish airport to Belarus until further notice.
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