At a press briefing on Tuesday, spokesman for Poland's special services minister-coordinator, Stanisław Żaryn, informed that a Belarusian Deputy Chairman of the State Border Committee General Major Roman Podlinev was identified among the people who stormed Polish border on November 16. "He looked like a person sent there to carry out some sort of supervisory, control mission," Żaryn added.
On November 16, next to a border crossing in Kuźnica, a group of migrants tried to force their way into Polish territory. They attacked Polish border guards with rocks, tree branches and flash grenades. The police responded with water cannons.
The attack lasted more than hours. In total, nine police officers, two border guards, and one soldier were injured. This has been the most serious incident at the Polish-Belarusian border so far.
At a press conference on Tuesday, Stanisław Żaryn, returned to these events and presented photos, taken during the attack on Kuźnica-Bruzgi crossing, showing a man in a uniform.
"This man's behaviour caught the attention of our soldiers and border guards. He looked like a person sent there to carry out some sort of supervisory, control mission. He seemed to have been "up to date" with what was happening along this section of our border," he said.
He added that the services have been able to identify this man. "It's General Major Roman Podlinev, deputy chief of Belarusian border guards," he said, adding that Podlinev has been serving in this function since 2019.
"In our opinion, presence of such a high-ranking person during attacks on the Polish border demonstrated the scale sof Belarusian services' involvement in those action," he Żaryn said. "It clearly shows that we're talking about a hybrid operation, which reaches much further than organising a migrant trail. At the same time, this man's presence and supervision has once again served as an example of methods used in conducting and organising such hybrid operations, which are under permanent control of Belarusian services," he added.
"According to my information, Roman Podlinev is a person who has been designated to supervise, control the whole operation of using migrants against us. Belarusian border guards play an active part in a propaganda war against Poland, in whch Mr Podlinev is also heavily involved, just as he is in other such operations aimed against Poland," Żaryn stressed.
Źródło: TVN24 News in English, PAP, tvn24.pl
Źródło zdjęcia głównego: twitter.com/StZaryn