Deep in the dense Bialowieza Forest, the Polish authorities have built a huge fence to prevent people crossing from Belarus.

Tens of thousands of people have attempted to cross from Belarus into Poland over the last two years. Most come from the Middle East or Africa, and are often fleeing conflict. Many are women and small children.

The Belarussian government, a close ally of Russia’s Vladimir Putin, has lured many of them with promises of taking them to the border of the European Union. Belarus aims to cause problems for the European Union by pushing people across its borders with Poland (and, less frequently, into Latvia and Lithuania).

People attempting to come into Poland from Belarus - unlike those fleeing the war in Ukraine - have often been met with hostility and violence by Polish border guards and other security forces. As elsewhere in Europe, Polish authorities also continue to target local human rights defenders who give humanitarian aid to those trying to help refugees.

A few weeks ago I was in the forest with local activists to research a report for Human Rights First that I co-authored with Maya Fernandez-Powell.

On one side of the fence were the activists, who are not allowed within 15 metres of the barrier. On the other a group of about 30 people from Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and elsewhere. Those pressed up against the fence on the other side and said clearly and repeatedly that they wanted to claim asylum in Poland.

Kids pushed their hands through the bars hoping for food or water, and the adults pleaded in broken English for legal and medical help. “We’ve clearly heard them through the fence, dozens of times, ask for asylum in Poland,” said activist Aleksandra Chrzanowska, who was at the scene. “They’re desperate and exhausted. And they’re already on Polish soil if they’re up against the fence. According to the law if they are applying for asylum they should be allowed to make a claim and have their case heard.”

As the fence is built just inside Polish territory, their claims were being made from inside Poland, but were rejected.

After several days the group dispersed back into the forest on the Belarus side without securing the asylum hearing in Poland to which they are entitled.

Local human rights defenders in Poland who try to provide legal and humanitarian aid to those who want to claim asylum report being judicially harassed, criminalized, threatened and physically attacked by Polish authorities.

Many of the activists are from the network Grupa Granica, set up to provide aid to those trapped in the forest.

Aleksandra Chrzanowska is from Grupa Granica and the Association for Legal Intervention, and is currently facing legal cases for her humanitarian work at the border. She says “the security presence along the border is everywhere. This constant stopping and questioning of people - Where are you going? What are you doing? It’s not normal in a European democracy. We’re stopped virtually every day. The goal is to scare us or annoy us. The questioning can be aggressive - the implication is that we’re helping people stay illegally in the country.”

Activist Ola Ziemianska of the Szpila Collective said “The authorities are targeting the activists helping those at the border in three main ways: first by constantly fining people, hoping to exhaust them with repeated court procedures; second by bringing very serious fake charges against some of the activists which could end up in long jail sentences; and third by targeting the activist leaders with judicial harassment, including being summoned for interrogation.” Local activists say such experiences are far from uncommon.

The courts have sometimes proved to be allies of the activists. In a January 2023 report Grupa Granica noted that “court decisions in the past year have shown that the main purpose of repression by uniformed services against humanitarian activists in the Polish-Belarusian border area is to create a so-called ‘chilling effect’ aimed at intimidation or discouragement of activists.” The report highlights that in the vast majority of cases, the courts dismiss charges against activists and emphasize that providing help is not illegal.

For example, on 31 May 2023, the District Court in Hajnówka ruled that an Iraqi man living in Germany who had come to help his family in the forest in October 2021 was not acting unlawfully. The court recognized that he had helped several family members, including children, who were freezing, tired, hungry, on the verge of physical exhaustion, and in a situation threatening their health and perhaps life.

The court ruled that what he did in helping them “was not socially harmful and therefore did not constitute a crime,” and that his action “deserves neither condemnation nor criminal penalization.” The prosecutor is appealing the verdict.

“The courts have again sensibly ruled that helping people in need is a good thing, not something to be prosecuted,” said Marta Górczyńska, a lawyer with Warsaw-based NGO the Helsinki Foundation. “The police and prosecutors should stop bringing these cases, wasting court time and harassing people who are showing compassion.”

But the attacks on the activists continue. Some are charged with people smuggling-related offences that carry jail sentences of up to eight years in prison.

The forest is a dangerous place for the activists and for those they are trying to help.

“Drones and guards constantly patrol the fence, and activists are often fined 500 zloty (£96) for getting too near the fence and another 500 zloty for passing food or medicine to people on the other side,” said Ola Ziemianska. “Since the fence went up we’re seeing more cases of broken bones and cuts to people’s bodies when they’ve tried to climb over. Some pregnant women have also lost their pregnancies trying to get across the fence.”

Many of those attempting to cross through the forest don’t make it, and dozens have died trying. Piotr Czaban is one of those trying to help survivors in the forests, and he reports of constant harassment by border guards. He also searches for those who have gone missing in the forest, where dead bodies are regularly discovered.

“In February 2023 we were looking for a boy from Yemen who was missing,” he said. “But instead we found another body, of an Ethiopian boy. We’re trying to identify him through DNA testing.”

Local activists predict that Poland's general election campaign in the autumn will likely see a rise in far-right rhetoric from government officials and others, aimed at refugees and those who assist them. It looks like more tough months ahead for those in the forest.

 

Dr. Brian Dooley is Senior Advisor at Human Rights First, a U.S.- based NGO. He specialises in working with Human Rights Defenders (HRDs) in conflict and post-conflict contexts, and was senior advisor to the UN Special Rapporteur on HRDs Mary Lawlor 2020-2023. His most recent work has been in the Hong Kong revolution and on Russia’s war on Ukraine. He has also written two books related to the conflict in Northern Ireland, including a comparative study of the civil rights movements in the U.S. and Northern Ireland.