Olympics Live: Friday, July 23

On Friday, two trucks with material humanitarian aid set out from the fire brigade from Zbiroh in the Rokycany region to Lithuania. The load of 20 tents, 100 folding beds with mattresses, 500 blankets, 20 heaters and 500 sleeping bags worth 3.2 million crowns is to help cope with the wave of illegal migration flowing from Belarus. The convoy with humanitarian aid should arrive in Lithuania on Saturday, said Klára Dlubalová from the Ministry of the Interior, which paid for the contingent from its On-Site Assistance program.

“It is unacceptable for the Czech Republic to use migration as a tool of pressure on the European Union or its individual member states. By no means do we want the situation on the Lithuanian-Belarusian border to escalate, and therefore our rapid assistance must follow. we are negotiating financial assistance for border protection, “said Interior Minister Jan Hamáček (CSSD).

The situation on the Lithuanian-Belarusian border was discussed in Slovenia by EU interior ministers last week. Hamáček expressed his solidarity and support for Lithuania and confirmed that the Czechia is ready to help Lithuania financially and materially and by sending its experts within the European agencies Frontex and EASO. Since the beginning of the year, 2,228 migrants have been detained at the border, which is 27 times more than in the whole of last year, the TASS agency reported on Wednesday.

Last week, the Lithuanian parliament called the influx of migrants through Belarus a “hybrid aggression”. Lithuania, which has given refuge to many Belarusian opposition politicians, accuses the Belarusian regime of purposefully allowing migrants to cross the common border, which is both the EU’s external border and the Schengen area of ​​free movement of persons. Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Shimonyté has indicated that Belarus is offering migrants flights to Minsk from Baghdad and possibly also from Istanbul. Vilnius called on the EU to consider imposing further sanctions on the Lukashenko regime.

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