The Estonian police and border guard agency announced on Friday it has dispatched a police unit to Lithuania to help manage the border with Belarus amid the migrant crisis
HELSINKI (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 10th December, 2021) The Estonian police and border guard agency announced on Friday it has dispatched a police unit to Lithuania to help manage the border with Belarus amid the migrant crisis.
"The department has sent to Lithuania a new team of the ESTPOL5 police unit, consisting of 16 police officers, including drone control specialists and dog handlers. The task of the Estonian police is to guard a local base in cooperation with their Lithuanian colleagues. The drone pilots will also monitor the section of the Lithuanian-Belarusian border, helping prevent illegal migration from Belarus to Lithuania," the agency's press service said in a statement.
This is Estonia's sixth consecutive mission to Lithuania under a bilateral agreement. It will last one month, the agency noted.
The first ESTPOL5 team was sent by Estonia to Lithuania on July 7. On November 19, Estonia also sent 65 miles of barbed wire, 20 officers and two drones to Lithuania.
Since July, Lithuania, Latvia and Poland have reported an increase in the number of illegal migrants crossing from neighboring Belarus. They accuse Minsk of orchestrating the crisis in retaliation for the European Union sanctions. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko denied the accusations and said that his country no longer has the capacity to prevent the movement of migrants toward the EU due to sanctions.
