Poland intends to send a military attaché to Belarus

Poland intends to send a military attaché to Belarus, the Polish News Agency reported on Thursday, citing a spokesperson for the country’s foreign ministry.Last Friday, Belarus expelled three Polish diplomats, including a border guard liaison officer, in response to Poland’s closure of one of two border checkpoints for trucks.Poland has become a refuge for many opponents of Alexander Lukashenko and provides significant assistance to Ukraine in its fight against Russian aggression.Polish Interior Minister Mariusz Kaminsky announced the closure of the Bobrovniki border crossing on February 9 after a Belarusian court sentenced Andrzej Poczobut, a Belarusian journalist and activist for the Independent Union of Poles in Belarus, to eight years imprisonment for incitement to religion and ethnic hatred.Poczobut was arrested in March 2021 and has remained in jail ever since. The European Parliament and human rights groups point out that he is a political prisoner.On February 17, the Belarusian Foreign Ministry introduced new restrictions on Polish goods that can only cross the Polish-Belarusian border and can no longer use Belarusian border crossings with Latvia and Lithuania.Earlier Thursday, Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak tweeted that Poland would place additional defences, including anti-tank barriers, on the border with Belarus and Russia as part of a “defense and deterrence strategy”. .