“Due to the epidemiological situation in neighboring countries, Belarus is temporarily restricting the entry of certain categories of natural persons through land border crossings from Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine,” said a statement from the Belarusian State Border Guard Committee quoted by Tut.by yesterday.
It is stated that these restrictions do not apply to staff of diplomatic missions and consular posts, drivers of international road transport vehicles and train crews of international rail traffic.
As Lithuanian Foreign Minister Lin Linkevich previously told BNS, Lithuania has not received any official information from Minsk about the decision and diplomats are currently trying to clarify the situation.
“Our embassy in Minsk was interested, but has not yet received official information. There is only unofficial information, there was no official, we only actually see that the border is closed. We only got the information with great effort from border guards – it was explained that it was due to a pandemic, “he pointed out, adding that for the time being, it is quite difficult to assess and interpret such actions of Minsk, taking into account the situation in the neighboring country.
On Thursday afternoon, first we received news that people could not return to Belarus from Poland and Lithuania, later information about the problems of entering the country also came from Ukraine and Latvia. It was reported that only trucks and diplomatic vehicles were allowed into the country, while others were told to return.
On the other hand, everyone who wants to leave the country is allowed to leave, but international bus drivers and passengers are warned that they will not be able to return if they now cross the border.
The border checkpoint at Minsk Airport operates without restrictions, according to “Tut.by”.
Rustams Lubajevs, the head of the Lithuanian State Border Guard Service, admitted that this situation was completely unexpected for Lithuanian border guards. According to him, at around 4 pm, Belarusian citizens with residence permits in Lithuania and Estonia are no longer allowed across the border, but given that traffic flows have now fallen sharply, it is difficult to judge which categories of people are covered by the ban.
As political scientist Vītis Jurkonis told the Lithuanian public broadcaster’s news portal “Lrt.lt”, it is possible that these steps in Minsk are related to the events of recent days, including the redistribution of positions in the Belarusian authorities, including the removal of Interior Minister Yuri Karayev.
Belarusian authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko on Thursday replaced the heads of several security services, including the interior minister, by replacing Ivan Kubrakov, commander of the Minsk police force, in place of Karayev.
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