Poland to reinforce border with Belarus - interior minister

MINSK. Dec 22 (Interfax) - Poland plans to further reinforce its border with Belarus, Polish Interior and Administration Minister Marcin Kierwinski said.

"The fence [on the Polish-Belarusian border] is not [properly] performing its function. It could not fully ensure security on our border. And it's going to be developed and upgraded to become more efficient," Kierwinski said on Radio ZET on Friday.

"We'll take steps to reinforce the Podlasie unit of the Border Guard [acting on the border with Belarus]. I am firmly convinced that we need a substantial personnel reinforcement," he said.

In January-December 2022, Poland built a 186-kilometer long and 5.5-meter high metal barbed wire-topped fence along its entire border with Belarus except for the section passing along the Bug River.

Poland completed installing an electronic barrier along the land border with Belarus in summer 2023. It includes 11 containers with electronic control systems integrated into them, including night-vision cameras, thermal imagers, and dozens of kilometers of detection cables. The electronic barrier's operations are monitored from a surveillance center in Bialystok.