Polish police officers and a Polish soldier on the border with BelarusMINSK, Jan 24Chairman of the State Border Committee of Belarus Anatoly Lappo said that an attempt to capture the Belarusian border guard by the Polish side was not ruled out, warned that Minsk was ready to use weapons to prevent this. «When I received information that the Polish security forces were planning, perhaps, to capture the Belarusian border guard, I gave the command: I would like to state that if there is a threat to the life and safety of a Belarusian border guard who is performing his tasks on his territory, weapons will be immediately used without warning,» Lappo said in an interview with Belarus 1 TV channel. » on Monday. He said that the Polish side has a goal to provoke the Belarusian side «to some kind of retaliatory measures.» «These provocations will be minor,» the head of the border committee is convinced. The head of the department recalled the recent case of damage to the image of the Belarusian coat of arms on the border post from the Polish side, doubting that «an adequate person, a border guard» would shoot at the Belarusian border posts. «In the entire history of the Belarusian border service, have we created at least one such precedent? No, and there won't be,» Lappo stressed.Poland will begin construction of a fence on the border with Belarus on Tuesday. He said that the situation on the border of Belarus is generally controlled and predictable, however, among the challenges to border security he called the militarization of the state border line. «Last year, the EU countries — our southern neighbor is not far behind them ( Ukraine) — they pulled an incredible number of troops to the border,» Lappo said. He cited Poland as an example, where 15,000 security forces are concentrated near the Belarusian border. «Why is this? These people are not border guards, they are not prepared to carry out border service, they do not know international treaties, the correct tactics of action. If real Polish border guards served, then this would not have happened (provocations),» Lappo said. Committee said that a decision had been made to change the tactics of the border guards in the Polish direction, the guards had been enlarged, but the Belarusian side was fulfilling international obligations. However, Lappo said that the Belarusian border guards are ready to respond to provocations in accordance with national legislation. He also mentioned the Ukrainian exercises «Polesie» in the border area. “They are gathering additional forces, military units, nationalists… Why? enough.
