{"id":301270,"date":"2021-09-07T06:28:22","date_gmt":"2021-09-07T06:28:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dissidentvoice.org\/?p=120776"},"modified":"2021-09-07T06:28:22","modified_gmt":"2021-09-07T06:28:22","slug":"weaponised-refugees-and-hybrid-attacks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2021\/09\/07\/weaponised-refugees-and-hybrid-attacks\/","title":{"rendered":"Weaponised Refugees and Hybrid Attacks"},"content":{"rendered":"

Refugees and asylum seekers provide rich pickings for demagogues and political opportunists.\u00a0 The Australian approach politicises their plight by arguing that they are illegitimate depending on the way they arrive, namely, by boat.\u00a0 The twentieth anniversary of the MV Tampa<\/em>\u2019s attempt to dock at Christmas Island with over 400 such individuals inaugurated a particularly vicious regime.\u00a0 Intercepted by Australia\u2019s SAS forces in August 2001, it presented the Howard government with a stupendously cruel chance to garner votes.\u00a0 And my, did that government garner them with gusto!<\/p>\n

Various European countries have also adopted an approach akin to this: naval arrivals from the Middle East and Africa are to be contained, detained, and preferably processed in third countries through a range of agreements.\u00a0 The common theme to all: firm border controls and deterrence.<\/p>\n

Belarus has added another option to the armoury of refugee use and abuse.\u00a0 The country, under Alexander Lukashenko, has hit upon a shoddy plan to harry countries sympathetic to his opponents and responsible for imposing sanctions upon his regime: swamp them.\u00a0 First: entice refugees and migrants from a number of countries \u2013 Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Syria and Cameroon \u2013 to arrive on tourist visas.\u00a0 Mobilise said people to move across the Polish, Lithuanian and Latvian borders.<\/p>\n

Descriptions have been offered for the strategy.\u00a0 Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis considered the acts on the part of Belarus as a \u201chybrid war operation\u201d that threatened, he claimed<\/a> with dramatic effect, \u201cthe entire European Union\u201d.\u00a0 In July, he told<\/a> Deutsche Welle that the refugees concerned were being used as \u201chuman shields\u201d and a type of \u201chybrid weapon\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0 Lithuanian Deputy Interior Minister Arnoldas Abramavi\u010dius resented<\/a> his country\u2019s border guards \u201cacting as a kind of hotel reception for the migrants for a long time. That had to stop.\u201d<\/p>\n

Member states have been sharing experiences on how best to deal with the surge in these Lukashenko arrivals.\u00a0 In a meeting between Landsbergis and his Greek counterpart Nikos Dendias in June, much solidarity was felt in discussing how to combat a common threat.\u00a0 Human rights proved to be less important than territorial integrity and European defence.\u00a0 As the Lithuanian Foreign Ministry stated<\/a>, both ministers \u201cunderscored the importance of European solidarity and the need to pay attention to the processes in the EU neighbourhood, as well as to be ready to respond to dangerous threats emerging from the EU\u2019s neighbourhood.\u201d<\/p>\n

Guards along the Lithuanian border had, up till August, intercepted<\/a> approximately 4,100 refugees and asylum seekers this year alone.\u00a0 Last year, that number was a mere 81.\u00a0 The numbers prompted the Baltic state to declare a state of emergency in July.\u00a0 The resources of Frontex, that less than transparent body otherwise known as the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, deployed personnel with haste that same month to aid policing the border with Lithuania and Latvia.<\/p>\n

According to Frontex, the initial support would involve<\/a> \u201cborder surveillance and other border management functions.\u00a0 The operation will start with the deployment of 10 officers with patrol cars, and their numbers will be gradually increased.\u201d<\/p>\n

The agency\u2019s executive director Fabrice Leggeri was brimming with praise<\/a> for the organisation\u2019s military-styled prowess, suggesting aid in the face of threatening barbarians at the frontier of Europe.\u00a0 \u201cThe quick deployment in support of Lithuania and Latvia highlights the value of the Frontex standing troops, which allows the Agency to quickly react to unexpected challenges, bringing European solidarity to support Member States at the external borders.\u201d<\/p>\n

Humanitarianism is the last thing on Leggeri\u2019s mind as he speaks about the role of \u201cadditional border guards and patrol guards by Frontex\u201d as they \u201cwork side-by-side with their Latvian and Lithuanian colleagues\u201d to \u201cprotect our external borders\u201d in common cause.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month Poland joined Lithuania with alarmist fervour, declaring<\/a> a state of emergency.\u00a0 It served the purpose of needlessly militarising the situation even as it appealed to the inner jingo.\u00a0 Tellingly, it is the first such order since the country\u2019s communist era, proscribing mass gatherings and limiting people\u2019s movements within a 3 km strip of land along the frontier for 30 days.\u00a0 Marta Anna Kurzyniec, resident of the Polish border town of Krynki, described<\/a> an atmosphere that was \u201cgenerally violent\u201d.\u00a0 There were \u201cuniformed, armed servicemen everywhere \u2026 it reminds me of war.\u201d<\/p>\n

To the use of troops can be added such inhospitable barriers as the construction of a 508 km razor-wire fence by the Lithuanian authorities.\u00a0 Lithuania\u2019s Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte considered<\/a> it an essential part of her country\u2019s strategy of repelling unwanted arrivals. \u201cThe physical barrier is vital to repel this hybrid attack, which the Belarus regime is undertaking against Lithuania.\u201d<\/p>\n

Political figures such as Poland\u2019s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and Lithuania\u2019s Landsbergis have also encouraged disseminating stern messages of disapproval to those trying to enter their countries.\u00a0 \u201cWe need to inform the people that they are being lied to,\u201d huffed<\/a> Landsbergis.\u00a0 \u201cThey are being promised an easy passage to Europe, a very free life in Europe.\u00a0 This is not going to happen.\u201d\u00a0 Morawiecki, despite claiming<\/a> some sympathy for \u201cthe migrants who have been in an extremely difficult situation\u201d felt that \u201cit should be clearly stated that they are a political instrument.\u201d<\/p>\n

The situation has also seen the European Court of Human Rights make a much needed appearance in its request<\/a> that both Poland and Latvia \u201cprovide all the applicants with food, water, clothing, adequate medical care and, if possible, temporary shelter.\u201d\u00a0 The Court, however, wanted it known \u201cthat this measure should not be understood as requiring that Poland or Latvia let the applicants enter their territories.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Polish government, for its part, insists that their hearts have not hardened, dabbling in its own bit of dissembling for the press.\u00a0 As a spokeswoman for the interior ministry claimed<\/a>, \u201cThese people are on the Belarusian side of the border.\u201d<\/p>\n

The manipulation of such human traffic created its fair share of bestial realities ignoring the fundamentals of the UN Refugee Convention and an assortment of international instruments, including the Geneva Convention.\u00a0 This is particularly so regarding a number of Afghan refugees who find themselves stuck at Usnarz Gorny, 55 km east of Bialystok.\u00a0 \u201cThey\u2019re the victims of the political game between countries,\u201d came the accurate assessment<\/a> from Amnesty International Poland\u2019s Aleksandra Fertlinska.\u00a0 \u201cBut what is the most important is that it doesn\u2019t matter what is the source of this political game.\u00a0 They are refugees, and they are protected by [the] Geneva Convention what we need to do is accept them.\u201d<\/p>\n

One Iraqi refugee by the name of Slemen, finding himself in the drenched environs of R\u016bdninki, some 38 kilometres from the Lithuanian capital Vilnius, offers his own relevant observation.\u00a0 \u201cJust because we came through Belarus doesn\u2019t make us bad people,\u201d he explained<\/a> to Der Spiegel<\/em>. But bad he, and his fellow travellers, are being made out to be by states who overlook the compassion of processing claims in favour of an instinctive politics stressing deluge and threat rather than salvation and hope.<\/p>The post Weaponised Refugees and Hybrid Attacks<\/a> first appeared on Dissident Voice<\/a>.\n

This post was originally published on Dissident Voice<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Refugees and asylum seekers provide rich pickings for demagogues and political opportunists.\u00a0 The Australian approach politicises their plight by arguing that they are illegitimate depending on the way they arrive, namely, by boat.\u00a0 The twentieth anniversary of the MV Tampa\u2019s attempt to dock at Christmas Island with over 400 such individuals inaugurated a particularly vicious [\u2026]<\/p>\n

The post Weaponised Refugees and Hybrid Attacks<\/a> first appeared on Dissident Voice<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[78,34887,34591,1056,8139,238],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301270"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=301270"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301270\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":301353,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301270\/revisions\/301353"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=301270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=301270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=301270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}