Protesting Polish farmers threaten to blockade the Lithuanian-Polish border

If it is not possible to resolve the situation through diplomatic means, a number of problems may arise for vehicles crossing the Lithuanian-Polish border at Kalvarija tomorrow.

Protesting Polish farmers intend to block the border at Kalwaria for a whole week from Friday and control the movement of freight transport in this area.

True, according to the latest data, the blockade should not be complete, its organizers said that they will check the loads of entering and leaving trucks, whether they are not related to agricultural products.

Will block two border points

Polish farmers are protesting against Ukrainian grain imports. Now they are preparing for two new blockades: the Polish-German border point in the town of Świecko and the road that used to be the crossing point of the Polish-Lithuanian Kalvarija-Budzinsk border.

According to the Polish media, the Kalvarija-Budzinsko border crossing point is planned to be blocked for a week from March 1. 10 o’clock

As Karolis Pieczynskis, the organizer of the blockade, told the Polish media, it is possible that farmers from Lithuania will join the protest action of the Polish farmers, who will block the traffic from their side. The organizer of the protest claims that Ukrainian grain is brought into Lithuania in transit, across the Polish-Lithuanian border. There is a truck with Ukrainian grain, which Poland imported from September 15 of last year. embargoed, returned to the border and brought into Poland. Polish farmers demand that Lithuania join the transit restrictions.

The main demand of the initiators: Ukrainian grain must travel to the port of Klaipėda, and then leave by ship to non-EU markets.

Farmers’ protests broke out on the Polish-Ukrainian border in November of last year. As a result, the movement of transport at the border is very difficult. Protesting farmers express dissatisfaction with the European Commission’s decision to extend duty-free trade with Ukraine until 2025. Polish carriers demand that Ukraine introduce a separate queue for vehicles returning to Poland without goods. Other demands from carriers include the introduction of commercial permits for Ukrainian companies to transport goods, except for humanitarian aid and supplies for the Ukrainian military, and the suspension of licenses and inspections of companies that were established after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Awaiting the Minister’s negotiations

Our colleague, the editor of the punskas.pl news portal, Sigitas Birgelis, said he was aware of the planned border blockade.

“Events change every day. The Polish Minister of Agriculture is planning to come here these days and has to talk to the protesting farmers. There is news that they are going to block the border and not allow cargo transport to enter or leave for a whole week. They are blocking the border because they want to draw attention to certain processes: the fact that food and grain transit through Poland, cross the Lithuanian border, turn around, change documents and re-enter Poland as European Union cargo. They enter back with changed documents, no one controls that transport, because it is already a product of the European Union,” said the man from Punska.

According to him, the farmers of the Warmian-Masurian and Palenque Voivodeships are participating in this protest, and a very large action is planned.

“It should be assumed that farmers will come from many places, it will not be just a local farmers’ action. It is true that there is still an opportunity to stop it, if the minister manages to reach an agreement with the farmers”, said S. Birgelis.

A colleague from Punsk said that in the event of a border blockade, heavy vehicles can try to drive through Kreivėni, where the blockade is not planned, but the road is very bad there, and it will be difficult to leave.

What right do Polish farmers have to inspect our cargo, will the European Union institutions allow the Poles to do so?

Member of the European Parliament Petras Auštrevičius comments:
“The tune is not very pleasant and, in fact, the consequences may be worse than we think.” I see this as a developing but not yet clear ending situation. It is frankly a very unhelpful situation politically, the situation is quite serious. Tension between the neighbors, someone is trying to cause it, they don’t know how it ends. Extraneous processes appear, something turns into something else, and so on. In other words, this initiative of the Polish farmers, which I have no doubt was promoted by the confederation, a pro-Russian anti-Western political force in Poland, is directed against the West, against our solidarity. I consider it as a provocative action that was really not needed, is not needed and maybe it will not happen yet.”