25/09: 12 people stuck between Belarus and Poland

25.09.2021 / 11:22 / Belarus/Poland

Watch The Med Alarm Phone Investigations – 25th of September 2021

Case name: 20210925-BEL/POL002

Situation: 12 people stuck between Belarus and Poland

Status of WTM Investigation: Concluded

Place of Incident: Belarus/Poland

Summary of the Case:

On September 25, the Alarm Phone was alerted to a group of 12 people in distress on the Polish side of the border to Belarus (GPS position: N 53 36' 18"; E 23 37' 05" @ 13.47 CEST 23 September).

We received the info from a relative who told us that the travelers had been out in the open for days, they lacked food and water and their health situation was critical. According to the relative, one person of the group had died of water poisoning – this information we were not able to confirm.

We informed UNHCR and Red Cross in Poland and Belarus via E-mail about the distress case. Several calls to the UNHCR and Red Cross in Poland as well as to the police station of the closest city nearby (Bialystok) were left unanswered. We could only once establish contact to the Police headquarter in Warsaw but the officer on duty just told us to call 112.

In the afternoon we received a new GPS position (53.6677780, 23.6011160 @17:39 CEST 25 September) which showed that the group had been heading north along the border and moved back to the Belarusian side. Our contact informed us that they were safe but under police watch.

We then lost contact to the group and only found out later that they had been intercepted by the Polish police, pushed back and arrested in Belarus.

We highly condemn these politics that are currently willingly accepting the deaths on the border between Belarus and Poland!
Last update: 11:28 Nov 13, 2021
Credibility: UP DOWN 0
Layers »
  • Border police patrols
     
    While the exact location of patrols is of course constantly changing, this line indicates the approximate boundary routinely patrolled by border guards’ naval assets. In the open sea, it usually correspond to the outer extent of the contiguous zone, the area in which “State may exercise the control necessary to prevent infringement of its customs, fiscal, immigration or sanitary laws” (UNCLOS, art. 33). Data source: interviews with border police officials.
  • Coastal radars
     
    Approximate radar beam range covered by coastal radars operating in the frame of national marine traffic monitoring systems. The actual beam depends from several different parameters (including the type of object to be detected). Data source: Finmeccanica.
  • Exclusive Economic Zone
     
    Maritime area beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea in which the coastal state exercises sovereign rights for the purposes of exploring and exploiting, conserving and managing the natural resources, whether living or non-living, the seabed and its subsoil and the superjacent waters. Its breadth is 200 nautical miles from the straight baselines from which the territorial sea is measured (UNCLOS, Arts. 55, 56 and 57). Data source: Juan Luis Suárez de Vivero, Atlas of the European Seas and Oceans
  • Frontex operations
     
    Frontex has, in the past few years, carried out several sea operations at the maritime borders of the EU. The blue shapes indicate the approximate extend of these operations. Data source: Migreurop Altas.
  • Mobile phone coverage
     
    Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) network coverage. Data source: Collins Mobile Coverage.
  • Oil and gas platforms
     
    Oil and gas platforms in the Mediterranean. Data source:
  • Search and Rescue Zone
     
    An area of defined dimensions within which a given state is has the responsibility to co-ordinate Search and Rescue operations, i.e. the search for, and provision of aid to, persons, ships or other craft which are, or are feared to be, in distress or imminent danger. Data source: IMO availability of search and rescue (SAR) services - SAR.8/Circ.3, 17 June 2011.
  • Territorial Waters
     
    A belt of sea (usually extending up to 12 nautical miles) upon which the sovereignty of a coastal State extends (UNCLOS, Art. 2). Data source: Juan Luis Suárez de Vivero, Atlas of the European Seas and Oceans

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