Since the beginning of the year, the Polish authorities have not once refused to accept foreigners from the German side, the wPolityce.pl portal has found out. It also appears that more and more illegal migrants are being brought into Poland from the EU by air. In the last three months alone, such transports have arrived in our country from 14 EU countries.

The problem of sending foreigners back to Poland from the Community countries is not diminishing at all. On the contrary, it appears that the numbers are increasing, even though the route via Belarus is supposed to have been less frequently used by smugglers recently.

The Border Guard informed the wPolityce.pl portal in response to questions, that between 1 January and 15 September this year, 545 foreigners were transferred from the territory of Germany to our country. We inquired into the number of cases in which the Polish authorities refused to accept illegal migrants.

Poland did not refuse to accept foreigners from the German side

— wrote Lt Col Andrzej Juźwiak, spokesman for the Chief Commandant of the Border Guard. Interestingly, when we asked for the same statistics before the holidays, it turned out that 290 foreigners had been transferred from Germany to Poland from the beginning of the year until 6 June. This means that in the last three months their number has been comparable to the number of returns in the first six months of 2024.

One can therefore conclude that in recent weeks the number of foreigners sent back by our western neighbours has increased by 100 per cent in comparison with the first half of this year.

It is also striking that in no case did Poland find the slightest discrepancy and politely accepted anyone whom the Germans wanted to get rid of.

We also asked the Border Guard about foreigners sent back to Poland from EU countries by air transport. To our astonishment, it turned out that these were not isolated cases. Only from the beginning of June to 10 September, 135 persons were sent back to Poland by this means.

According to the information provided by the Border Guard, in the last three months, Norway was the country that solved its problems most frequently in this way - in 66 cases. This was followed by Austria (11 cases), Germany (10), Estonia (9), the Netherlands (8), Sweden (7), Denmark (5), Iceland (5), Finland (4), Switzerland (3), Belgium (3), Luxembourg (2), France (1) and Malta (1).

How does it work?

Foreigners are transferred to the territory of the Republic of Poland from other Member States on the basis of international agreements, readmission agreements to which the transferring state and Poland are parties. If Poland agrees to accept a foreigner on its territory, it is the transferring state which is responsible for organising the foreigner’s transfer to Poland (organising the journey, possibly securing an escort, etc.) and covers the costs of such a transport

— describes Lt. Col. Juźwiak.

Anticipating the fact that more and more foreigners are being sent back to Poland from the Community countries, we also asked about the current load of Polish centres for foreigners. According to the reply sent to us, as of 17 September (7 a.m.), there were only 265 vacancies left in all centres in our country.

Tłum. K.J.