Agreement on cross border travelling signed in Warsaw

Citizens of Belarus and Poland living in the border zone can apply for special visas.

Foreign Ministers of Poland and Belarus Radoslaw Sikorski and Syarhei Martynau signed an agreement regulating travels of citizens of frontier districts in Warsaw on Friday.

In accordance with the agreement, visa-free border crossing will be able if one has a sanction (permit) valid for two years (if granted for the first time) and five years (if granted again). The permit will be available for the people who have documents proving they have permanently resided in the frontier distircts for at least three years. Belarusian citizens will be able get permits in Polish consulates in Brest and Hrodna, Polish citizens will be able to apply for permits in Belarusian consulates in Bialystok and Biala Podlaska.

Poland proposed to sign an agreement with Belarus on local border traffic in February 2008. The arrangement on local border traffic covers districts and towns of the Lublin, Masovian, Podlaskie Voivodeships inhabited by 590,000 people, including such towns as Biala Podlaska, Augustow, Bielsk Podlaski, Hajnowka, Sokolka, Siemiatycze, and Belarusian towns and villages inhabited by 1,100,000 people, including Brest and Hrodna, the Polish website Puls Biznesu informs.

“The simplified rules on border traffic will come into force in summer,” Robert Tyszkiewicz, the Chairman of Polish-Belarusian Group of the Polish Parliament, thinks.

“If we analyze the time when the border traffic arrangement with Ukraine was ratified we can notice that it was signed in the first quarter of 2009 and ratified in July,” Tyszkiewicz said.

The MP notes ratifying the arrangement with Belarus may take as much time if the Belarusian party doesn’t drag on this issue and suspend the process of ratifying the agreement by the apraliemnts and presidents.

Local border traffic will cover a 30-kilometre zone on both sides of the Belarusian-Polish border. A permit for local border traffic will cost 20 euros.