Over 100 mercenaries belonging to the Wagner group in Belarus have moved closer to the Polish border and could pose a threat to Poland, the Polish prime minister has said.
Key points:
- Mr Morawiecki said the move was part of a process of “hybrid attacks” on Poland conducted from Belarus
- Poland has moved more than 1,000 troops to the border amid concerns over Wagner fighters
- Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that an African initiative could be a basis for peace in Ukraine
Mateusz Morawiecki said at a news conference that the mercenaries had moved close to the Suwalki Gap, a strategic stretch of Polish territory situated between Belarus and Kaliningrad, a Russian territory separated from the mainland.
Poland is a member of both the European Union and NATO, and it has worried about its security with Russian ally Belarus and Ukraine on its eastern border.
Those fears have grown since Wagner group mercenaries arrived in Belarus after the group’s short-lived rebellion earlier this summer.
The Poland-Belarus border has already been a tense place for a couple of years, ever since large numbers of immigrants from the Middle East and Africa began arriving, seeking to enter the EU by crossing into Poland, as well as Lithuania.
Mr Morawiecki said the move was part of a process of “hybrid attacks” on Poland conducted from Belarus, and said he thought Wagner mercenaries might pose as Belarusian border guards or try to infiltrate Poland.
“Now the situation becomes even more dangerous,” Mr Morawiecki told reporters.
However he did not give a source for the information, and the founder of the Belarusian opposition Hajun project, which monitors military activity in the country, told Reuters his group had not seen any evidence of the Wagner group moving closer to Grodno.
The city has a potentially significant position given it is near the Suwalki Gap, a strategic strip of land along the Polish-Lithuanian border, which divides Belarus, Russia’s ally, from the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.
Earlier this month, Poland began moving more than 1,000 troops to the east of the country amid rising concerns that the presence of Wagner fighters in Belarus could lead to increased tension on its border.
Putin says Russia does not reject talks with Ukraine
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that an African initiative could be a basis for peace in Ukraine but that Ukrainian attacks made it hard to realise.
He was speaking at a press conference after meeting African leaders in St Petersburg on Friday and hearing their calls for Moscow to move ahead with their plan.
“There are provisions of this peace initiative that are being implemented,” he said. “But there are things that are difficult or impossible to implement.”
African mediation in the conflict could begin with confidence-building measures followed by a cessation of hostilities agreement accompanied by negotiations between Russia and the West.
Mr Putin said that one of the points in the initiative was a ceasefire, adding: “But the Ukrainian army is on the offensive, they are attacking, they are implementing a large-scale strategic offensive operation … We cannot cease fire when we are under attack.”
On the question of starting peace talks, he said: “We did not reject them… In order for this process to begin, there needs to be agreement on both sides.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has rejected the idea of a ceasefire now that would leave Russia in control of nearly a fifth of his country and give its forces time to regroup after 17 grinding months of war.
Commenting on Russia’s withdrawal from the Black Sea Grain deal, Mr Putin said Russian companies will get more profit as grain prices have risen.
Russia will share the profit with the poorest countries thanks to free delivery of its grain, he added.
The Black Sea Grain Initiative was brokered last summer to allow shipments of Ukrainian grain to flow to countries in Africa, the Middle East and Asia where hunger is a growing threat and high food prices have pushed more people into poverty.
Russian missile kills two in Zaporizhzhia
A Russian missile attack killed two people and blew out apartment windows in the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia on Saturday, Anatoliy Kurtiev, secretary of the city council, said.
“An enemy missile hit an open area,” Mr Kurtiev said on Telegram. “Unfortunately a man and a woman died. Another woman was injured.”
Rescue crews were seen carrying the victims away in body bags in a wooded area beside a railway line a few hundred meters from a station in the city centre.
“The blast wave knocked out windows in high-rise buildings and damaged the building of an educational institution and a supermarket,” Mr Kurtiev said, adding that psychologists and other services were providing support on the ground.
At one apartment building, a 65-year-old woman who gave her name as Olena, sat behind the shattered window of a parking office booth and crossed herself as she described how she survived the impact uninjured.
“I was sitting here like this,” she said, gesticulating as she recalled the moment of the impact.
“It was just so unexpected,” she said. “All the glass went flying.”
Mr Kurtiev said the blast wave broke windows in 13 high-rise buildings and an educational institution.
ABC/wires