Home › Security › What Turkey's mediation offer and Belarus border meant
What Turkey's mediation offer and Belarus border meant
Summary
A look back at two security threads from late November 2021: an offer to mediate between Kyiv and Moscow, and a speech at the Belarus–Poland border.
What was on the security agenda in the region on 2 December 2021? Two developments from the preceding days framed it: an offer from Turkey to mediate between Ukraine and Russia, and a public appearance by the Belarusian president at the Polish frontier.
On 29 November 2021, Turkey offered to mediate between Ukraine and Russia over the conflict between the two countries. The offer was reported as part of the Russo-Ukrainian War.
Three days earlier, on 26 November 2021, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko appeared at the Belarus–Poland border for the first time since the migrant crisis began. He addressed the migrants there and told them they were free either to return home or to head west. As reported at the time, he said Belarus would not detain, choke or beat those who chose to go west.
The border crisis in context
The crisis had begun in August 2021, when the Belarusian government began sponsoring an influx of migrants, mostly from the Middle East and North Africa, to the borders of Lithuania, Poland and Latvia. Belarus denied involvement. The European Union and independent observers viewed the movement as hybrid warfare, carried out in response to the deterioration in Belarus–EU relations after the 2020 presidential election and the 2020–2021 protests.
Between August and December 2021, tens of thousands of unauthorised crossing attempts were recorded, peaking in October. Later, at least 20 migrants died over the following winter from harsh weather and abuse by border authorities.
The two threads, a diplomatic offer over Ukraine and a standoff on the EU's eastern frontier, were separate events, but both formed part of the security picture in Kyiv's neighbourhood as December 2021 began.
