A complete dead end – this is how the situation on the Ukrainian-Polish border is described by Volodymyrs Balins, vice-president of the Ukrainian Association of International Road Carriers.
Since November 6, the protest organized by Polish transporters at the border checkpoints with Ukraine has been ongoing, demanding restrictions on Ukrainian transporters.
As a result, huge queues of trucks are formed on both sides of the border, where more than two thousand trucks are waiting every day.
Although the protests at one of the border checkpoints in Dorohusk were stopped after several weeks of blockade, the blockade has been renewed there as of Monday afternoon.
Now they plan to let only one truck per hour pass through this border control point as well – it could be humanitarian cargo, cargo with animals and perishable goods. As a result, Ukrainians are back where they were – virtually paralyzed departure through Poland, which is the most direct way for Ukrainian businessmen to partners in the European Union.
Balins concludes that huge losses have already been caused to the Ukrainian economy, and they are not only for Ukrainians.
“Ukraine’s economy has lost more than a billion euros, Poland’s economy has lost even more. I think that our carriers, and we are ready for this, have to talk to exporters and importers about the fact that border crossing should be done through other countries.”
Polish carriers are demanding the restoration of the permit system for Ukrainian carriers, which the European Commission considers legally impossible.
The Ukrainians, involving the institutions of the European Union, are trying to reach a solution, but so far it has been unsuccessful. The new Polish government under the leadership of Donald Tusk has not yet managed to sort out this issue either. Poland’s infrastructure minister has accused the previous government of inaction and said the blockade will be very difficult to resolve.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian businessmen are currently changing their routes to reach European Union countries, choosing to go through Romania, Hungary, Slovakia or Moldova.
CONTEXT:
Since November 6, the blockade of cargo transport organized by Polish road transporters on the border with Ukraine has continued, as a result of which huge queues have formed on both sides of the border, both on the Ukrainian side and also in Poland.
In this way, Polish cargo carriers are protesting what they consider to be unfair competition from Ukrainian companies.
Polish businessmen report that the transport companies of the neighboring country have much lower costs, including wages. The electronic queue system in Ukraine is also said to be discriminatory, as Polish carriers have to wait much longer, even if the flight takes place without cargo.
In mid-November, Slovak cargo carriers also joined the protest for a short time.
Typo?
Highlight the text and press Ctrl+Enter to send the corrected text fragment to the editor!
Highlight the text and press the Report an error button to send the corrected text fragment to the editor!
Report a bug
2023-12-19 14:25:07
#Ukraine #ways #bypass #border #blockade #implemented #Polish #carriers
