Lithuania: Belarus could be behind migrant influx

Lithuania has detained nine Iraqi asylum-seekers who entered Baltic country from Belarus, officials said on Monday, pointing a finger at Belarus for allegedly being involved in sending repeated groups of immigrants into Lithuania.

two countries - both formerly part of Soviet sphere - share a nearly 680-kilometre-long (420-mile) frontier that serves as European Union’s external border.

On Monday, a member of Seimas, Lithuania’s Parliament, travelled to Belarus border.

Lawmaker Laurynas Kasciunas said re is a direct link between certain international flights to Minsk and groups of immigrants trying to come to Lithuania.

Lithuania said Belarus border guards have been covering tracks of migrants, and its state border guard service on Monday released foot it claimed showed guards doing this.

latest group that entered Lithuania came on Sunday.

Last week, 52 migrants were detained by Lithuanian border officials.

y are citizens of Iraq, Syria, Belarus and Russia and most sought asylum in Baltic country.

So far in 2021, about 160 people, mostly Iraqis, have entered Lithuania from Belarus - three times more than in all of 2020.

Lithuania’s support for Belarus opposition is longstanding, and its capital, Vilnius, has become a center for Belarusians in exile.

In 2020, Baltic nation gave shelter to Sviatlana Tsikhauskaya, main opposition challenger in Belarus’s disputed election that President Alexander Lukashenko won after 26 years of authoritarian rule.

A number of Belarusian ngovernmental organizations also have relocated to Vilnius, which hosts a university that Lukashenko banned.

In recent weeks, two countries have expelled a number of diplomats.

Last month, EU imposed sanctions on Belarus, including banning its airlines from using air and airports of 27-nation bloc, amid fury over forced diversion of a passenger jet en route to Vilnius to arrest Raman Pratasevich, an opponent to Lukashenko.

Lukashenko has warned that Belarus could retaliate against latest EU sanctions by loosening border controls against Western-bound illegal migration and drug trafficking.

In Brussels, European Commission said situation in Lithuania "shows need for a European system to man migration and asylum. Irregular migration as well as people arriving to Europe to flee war or persecution can happen at any of EU’s external borders.”

bloc's executive body ded that it stands rey to offer operational support to Lithuania through EU’s ncies.

“But a structural response is needed,” European Commission said.

27-nation bloc wants to reform its asylum system, hoping that its countries will finally share responsibility for people seeking sanctuary or better lives.

move comes after years of chaos and disputes among its members over handling of migrants and refugees amid a recognition that current EU system for deciding wher y should receive protection or be sent home has failed.