Andrzej Pisalnik: Situation with Union of Poles can escalate at any moment

Border guards made photocopies of all notes and documents of members of the unrecognised Union of Poles of Belarus (UPB) as they were crossing the border today.

Charter97.org learnt it from Andrzej Pisalnik, a spokesman for the Union of Poles of Belarus that is not recognised by the Belarusian authorities. Meczyslaw Jaskiewicz, the head of the Union of Poles of Belarus, and Andzelika Borys, the head of the UPB Council, were detained at Bruzhi border crossing, but later released. Both are in Poland now.

– Border guards made photocopies of all notes in their notebooks and documents. They were set free after the procedure. They have not been presented any charges so far. The situation looks as follows: the authorities have collected some evidence and we can only hope that the evidence won't be used. However, we cannot rule out the possibility that the authorities will use the copies of passports against Meczyslaw Jaskiewicz and Andzelika Borys in some way. We will watch the developments after they return from Poland.

– Do you fear for the future of the UPB activists?

– It's yet hard to say. As you may know, the Union of Poles has been working as an underground organisation for nine years. We will mark the 10th anniversary of such work next year. We saw worse and better times during these years. We always remember about our status. We understand that the situation may escalate at any moment.

– The incident looks strange if we recall that [foreign minister] Uladzimir Makei visited Warsaw recently and met with Radoslaw Sikorski. He said at the meeting that “Belarus and Poland are fraternal nations”.

– Perhaps, it was a signal from the Belarusian authorities to Poland that they control the situation of the unrecognised Union of Poles. Neither the UPB leadership nor I know what Poland and Belarus talk about. I can only say that Polish diplomats will monitor the situation after today's incident. I can say for sure that we'll see a response to the incident.

The largest Polish media already picked up the topic and spread the news across Poland. Polish society already knows about it. It is a guarantee that Poland will react to the situation at least at the next talks with Belarus. Maybe, it will hint that the situation of the unrecognised Union of Poles should be normalised. We hope it will happen.