Poland’s Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski has claimed a £300 million border wall has proven ’98 per cent effective’ at preventing attempts of illegal migration from Belarus.
‘We had large numbers of people who were invited by Russia and Belarus from the Middle East and Africa who were then pushed across the Polish-Belarusian border into Poland,’ Sikorski told BBCR4’s Today programme.
Warsaw alleges that Minsk and Moscow have long been waging a ‘hybrid war’, seeking to flood Poland with refugees to strain the country’s finances and law enforcement resources, and destabilise civil society.
‘This year we have completed a big and beautiful fence with sensors overground, underground, with a patrol road alongside it, so hardly anybody gets through that barrier,’ Sikorski declared.
He also mentioned a recent amendment to immigration legislation that stipulates migrants attempting to reach Poland via Russia and Belarus can continue to apply for asylum in Poland, but only at consulate buildings in Moscow and Minsk.
The anti-migration fencing was completed in June 2022 and now spans a 116-mile-long stretch of the Polish-Belarusian border, but was subsequently upgraded with surveillance equipment, including CCTV cameras, heat and motion sensors.
The five-metre-high metal fence scythes through the Polish countryside, covered with miles upon miles of barbs and topped with razor wire.
Border checkpoints are also reinforced with huge concrete slabs, each weighing more than 1.5 tonnes, along with secondary walls and barbed-wire fencing.
Sikorski spoke to BBCR4 amid discussions about soaring illegal migration figures in Britain, with 20,000 migrants said to have arrived in Britain via small boats crossing The Channel so far in 2025.
Now, Polish authorities are proceeding full steam ahead with a new project – East Shield – which aims to transform its entire frontier with Belarus and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad into one gigantic, closely surveilled fortification.
The 400-mile-long construction, announced last year and targeted for completion in 2028, arguably constitutes the single most significant national security investment in Poland’s post-war history at more than £2 billion.
It was green-lit by Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government in response to Russia’s war in Ukraine, and Moscow and Minsk’s so-called hybrid war tactics.
In addition to the barbed wire-topped fencing, concrete reinforcements and secondary defences, the East Shield will see strips of land turned into minefields and littered with anti-tank fortifications including steel and concrete hedgehogs, ‘dragon’s teeth’ obstacles and deep trenches, along with drone defence equipment.
This multi-layered line of defence is expected to extend more than 200 metres back from the initial border wall.
Behind these defences, Warsaw is constructing bunkers, firing posts and other military infrastructure in the forests, woods and small villages spanning the length of the country to provide yet more resistance should the deterrent fail.
According to details provided by the government, the programme will also employ state-of-the-art surveillance equipment, including imagery intelligence (IMINT), signals intelligence (SIGINT), and acoustic monitoring to improve situational awareness of the would-be battlefield.
Cezary Tomczyk, Poland’s Secretary of State in the Ministry of National Defence, sees the mammoth project as not just a defence insurance policy for Poland, but for the whole of Europe.
Speaking at the launch of the project in 2024, he said: ‘Today we are making a decision that will change how we think about Poland’s security for decades. This is not just Poland’s border. It is the border of the European Union and NATO. The frontline of democracy, order and stability.’
As such, Poland worked to attract investment from the European Union’s lending and financing arm, the European Investment Bank (EIB), to help finance East Shied.
In March, the defence ministry announced that the EIB had agreed in principle to spend up to €1 billion on the project, close to half the forecasted cost.
Lieutenant General Stanislaw Czosnek, Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces, told Ukrainskaya Pravda in May that the invasion of Ukraine by Russia was the primary motivating factor behind East Shield.
‘The security environment in our region has significantly deteriorated. We are in a state of hybrid war, and we are acting in advance,’ he said.
In the months before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Poland was already struggling to cope with a constant stream of migrants crossing the border from Belarus.
Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko had urged migrants to forge a path further West and even began facilitating visas and travel from Middle Eastern countries to accelerate the process.
The move prompted Warsaw to break with EU migration policies and begin work on its border fence – a project whose necessity was justified in November 2021 when crowds of migrants attempted to bust through then-incomplete defences.
Heavily armed riot police and border security teams were dispatched to manage the ruckus.
In one particularly shocking clash, some members of a group of more than 1,000 migrants tried to hack down a barbed-wire fence only to meet a phalanx of Polish guards who forced them back with pepper spray.
Poland’s then-Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said: ‘The Polish government is determined and we will defend the security of our country,’ labelling the action an ‘invasion’ orchestrated by Belarus.
The border wall was completed after months of work in June 2022, but the number of people lodging asylum claims in Poland only continued to increase.
Hundreds of migrants have also attempted to penetrate the border fencing, mostly to no avail. Those that do manage to sneak or force their way through are swiftly detained by heavily armed Polish border guards patrolling the fence in armoured vehicles.
A brazen attempt to cut through the fence in March proved the last straw for Premier Donald Tusk, who promptly suspended the right to claim asylum in Poland for 60 days, save for unaccompanied minors, pregnant women, elderly or unwell people.
Earlier this year, the Polish government confirmed it would not take part in the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum, which the bloc implemented to manage the arrival of asylum seekers.
Under the agreement, states could either relocate a certain number of migrants, pay a financial contribution or provide operation support to help resettlement.
Tusk said: ‘Poland will not implement the Migration Pact in a way that would introduce additional quotas of immigrants in Poland.
‘We are ready to cooperate with everyone to protect Europe from illegal migration. However, Poland will not take on any additional burdens. We have already taken on more than anyone could have imagined just a few years ago.’
As Poland continues cracking down on illegal migration, Britain is struggling with record-breaking numbers of migrants arriving via small boats.
More than 20,000 people have reached Britain by crossing The Channel on migrant vessels since the start of the year.
The same milestone was not hit until mid-to-late August in previous years, including 2022 – the year which went on to see a record annual total of 45,700 arrivals.
Since the start of the so-called Channel crisis in 2018, more than 170,000 migrants have reached Britain by small boat – but only about four per cent have been removed.
The overall cost of the asylum system was £5.3billion in 2023-24, more than double the amount spent in 2021-22.
Accommodation costs are expected to hit more than £15billion over 10 years – triple the original estimate – the National Audit Office said in May.
French President Emmanuel Macron’s government recently agreed to change its rules so gendarmes and other officials can intercept dinghies already in the Channel, and prevent them heading for Britain.
The new ‘maritime doctrine’, expected to come into force in the next few weeks, will allow French police to block small boat departures within 300 metres of the shoreline.
However, French police unions are understood to have expressed concerns that their members may be required to enter the water wearing body armour, which can weigh up to 6lbs and would put them at risk of drowning.
Last month, sources said French officers had also raised concerns about being unable to carry firearms if they are required to go into the sea, because salt water would damage the weapons.
French police colonel Olivier Alary told the BBC earlier this month his teams ‘will be able to do more’ once the 300 metre rule comes into force.
