Ukraine builds a wall on the border with Belarus

Ukraine has started building a fortified wall along its border with Belarus, a senior Ukrainian official said, to protect it from its northern neighbor, whose territory Moscow has used as a launching point for its invasion and a springboard for rocket attacks.

The wall could also be aimed at preventing the government of Belarus, a repressive former Soviet republic, from allowing asylum seekers cross its territory into Ukraine, according to Yohann Michel, a research analyst with the International Institute for Strategic Studies think tank.

The construction extends for a few kilometers in the northwestern region of Volyn, a region that also borders on Poland, a faithful ally of Ukraine.

The video posted by Kyrylo Tymoshenko, a senior official in the Ukrainian president’s office Volodymyr Zelensky, it featured a concrete barrier topped with coils of barbed wire and green-painted watchtowers.

Although the wall was guarded by soldiers, its value seemed largely symbolic, given that the border between the two countries stretches for 1,050 kilometres, although part of its length passes through swampy terrain that would be difficult for a person to navigate. .

It was also unclear what protection the completed wall could offer tanks or artillery.

“This is one of the elements of the engineering barriers that are being put up to protect our border,” Tymoshenko said in a video he posted on messaging app Telegram on Sunday that showed him inspecting the wall.

“Of course, work continues not only in Volyn. This applies to all border regions with Belarus and Russia”.

the Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko he is a staunch ally of the Russian president Vladimir Putin and the United States and the European Union have imposed sanctions on Belarus for its support for the war.

Since last month, Russia has launched a series of Iranian-made drone strikes from Belarus that have damaged Ukrainian towns, cities and energy infrastructure.

At the same time, according to Ukrainian officials, Russia has massed thousands of troops in Belarus along its border with Ukraine, though their mission remains unclear.

Latvian Defense Minister Artis Pabriks said last month that the assembled force was likely to be too weak to stage a successful push across the border, and military experts say it would be difficult for him to break into western Ukraine to cut off the flow of Western military supplies to Ukraine through Poland.

Poland this year he built a wall along the border with Belarus to make it more difficult for asylum seekers to enter, following a crisis a year ago in which thousands of people tried to enter the European Union through Poland.

European leaders have accused the Belarusian government of allowing asylum seekers from the Middle East into the country and then funneling them west to Poland and Lithuania.

“Belarus can create more problems for Ukraine by forcing migrants to cross on foot,” Michel said.

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