‘Go through,' Belarus leader tells migrants at border

Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko yesterday told migrants stranded at the border with Poland that his country would help them to return home if they wanted but would not force them.

- MARIA KISELYOVA

Thousands of migrants are stuck on the European Union’s eastern frontier, in what the EU says is a crisis Minsk engineered by distributing Belarusian visas in the Middle East, flying them in and pushing them across the border. But Mr Lukashenko said it was the EU that deliberately provoked a humanitarian crisis that needed to be resolved and he told the migrants he would not play politics with their fate.

In his first public appearance at the border since the start of the crisis, Mr Lukashenko met migrants at a warehouse turned into a shelter and told them they were free to head west or go home as they chose. An Iraqi teenager told Mr Lukashenko she could not return home and hoped to continue on to Europe. “We won’t only hope,” he answered. “We will work together on your dream.”